^rasp^ 


THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 


THE  WORKS  OF 


JACK  LONDON 


THE  GALL 
OF  THE  WILD 


THE  REVIEW  OF  REVIEWS  COMPANY 
NEW    YORK 


UiRAKT 


COPYRIGHT,  1903, 
BY  JACK  LONDON. 

Set  up  and  electrotyped.  Published  July,  1903.  Re 
printed  July,  August,  September,  December.  1903; 
January,  March,  September,  November,  1904;  Febru 
ary,  April,  July,  1905;  January,  April,  November, 
1906;  June,  1907:  May,  June,  1908;  April,  1909; 
February,  1910;  September,  December,  1911:  April, 
September,  October,  1912. 

New  edition  May,  September,  1910.  October,  1913. 
May,  1915. 


> 

I 

CONTENTS 


Chapter  Page 

I.    INTO  THE  PRIMITIVE 9 

II.  THE  LAW  OF  CLUB  AND  FANG        ...       33 

III.  THE  DOMINANT  PRIMORDIAL,  BEAST        .        .        53 

IV.  WHO  HAS  WON  TO  MASTERSHIP     ...        83 
V.  THE  TOIL  OF  TRACE  AND  TRAIL        .        .        .103 

VI.  FOR  THE  LOVE.  OF  A  MAN        .        .        .        .135 

VII.  THE  SOUNDING  OF  THE  CALL  .                               165 


17743820 


I 

MTO  THE  PRIMITIVE 


THE 
CALL  OF  THE  WILD 


Into  the  Primitive 

"  Old  longings  nomadic  leap, 

Chafing  at  custom's  chain; 

Again  from  its  brumal  sleep 

Wakens  the  ferine  strain." 

BUCK  did  not  read  the  newspapers,  or 
he  would  have  known  that  trouble 
was  brewing,  not  alone  for  himself, 
but  for  every  tide-water  dog,  strong  of  muscle 
and  with  warm,  long  hair,  from  Puget  Sound 
to  San  Diego.  Because  men,  groping  in  the 
Arctic  darkness,  had  found  a  yellow  metal,  and 
because  steamship  and  transportation  com 
panies  were  booming  the  find,  thousands  of  men 
were  rushing  into  the  Northland.  These  men 
wanted  dogs,  and  the  dogs  they  wanted  were 

9 


io  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

heavy  dogs,  with  strong  muscles  by  which  to 
toil,  and  furry  coats  to  protect  them  from  the 
frost. 

Buck  lived  at  a  big  house  in  the  sun-kissed 
Santa  Clara  Valley.  Judge  Miller's  place,  it 
was  called.  It  stood  back  from  the  road,  half 
hidden  among  the  trees,  through  which  glimpses 
could  be  caught  of  the  wide  cool  veranda  that 
ran  around  its  four  sides.  The  house  was  ap 
proached  by  gravelled  driveways  which  wound 
about  through  wide-spreading  lawns  and  under 
the  interlacing  boughs  of  tall  poplars.  At  the 
rear  things  were  on  even  a  more  spacious  scale 
than  at  the  front.  There  were  great  stables, 
where  a  dozen  grooms  and  boys  held  forth, 
rows  of  vine-clad  servants'  cottages,  an  endless 
and  orderly  array  of  outhouses,  long  grape  ar 
bors,  green  pastures,  orchards,  and  berry 
patches.  Then  there  was  the  pumping  plant 
for  the  artesian  well,  and  the  big  cement  tank 
where  Judge  Miller's  boys  took  their  morning 
plunge  and  kept  cool  in  the  hot  afternoon. 

And  over  this  great  demesne  Buck  ruled. 
Here  he  was  born,  and  here  he  had  lived  the 


INTO  THE  PRIMITIVE  n 

four  years  of  his  life.  It  was  true,  there  were 
other  dogs.  There  could  not  but  be  other  dogs 
on  so  vast  a  place,  but  they  did  not  count. 
They  came  and  went,  resided  in  the  populous 
kennels,  or  lived  obscurely  in  the  recesses  of  the 
house  after  the  fashion  of  Toots,  the  Japanese 
pug,  or  Ysabl,  the  Mexican  hairless, —  strange 
creatures  that  rarely  put  nose  out  of  doors  or 
set  foot  to  ground.  On  the  other  hand,  there 
were  the  fox  terriers,  a  score  of  them  at  least, 
who  yelped  fearful  promises  at  Toots  and 
Ysabel  looking  out  of  the  windows  at  them  and 
protected  by  a  legion  of  housemaids  armed  with 
brooms  and  mops. 

But  Buck  was  neither  house-dog  nor  kennel 
dog.  The  whole  realm  was  his.  He  plunged 
into  the  swimming  tank  or  went  hunting  with 
the  Judge's  sons;  he  escorted  Mollie  and  Alice, 
the  Judge's  daughters,  on  long  twilight  or  early 
morning  rambles;  on  wintry  nights  he  lay  at 
the  Judge's  feet  before  the  roaring  library  fire; 
he  carried  the  Judge's  grandsons  on  his  back,  or 
rolled  them  in  the  grass,  and  guarded  their  foot 
steps  through  wild  adventures  down  to  the 


12  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

fountain  in  the  stable  yard,  and  even  beyond, 
where  the  paddocks  were,  and  the  berry  patches. 
Among  the  terriers  he  stalked  imperiously,  and 
Toots  and  Ysabel  he  utterly  ignored,  for  he 
was  king, —  king  over  all  creeping,  crawling, 
flying  things  of  Judge  Miller's  place,  humans 
included. 

His  father,  Elmo,  a  huge  St.  Bernard,  had 
been  the  Judge's  inseparable  companion,  and 
Buck  bid  fair  to  follow  in  the  way  of  his  father. 
He  was  not  so  large, —  he  weighed  only  one 
hundred  and  forty  pounds, —  for  his  mother, 
Shep,  had  been  a  Scotch  shepherd  dog.  !  Never 
theless,  one  hundred  and  forty  pounds,  to  which 
was  added  the  dignity  that  comes  of  good  living 
and  universal  respect,  enabled  him  to  carry  him 
self  in  right  royal  fashion.  During  the  four 
years  since  his  puppyhood  he  had  lived  the  life 
of  a  sated  aristocrat;  he  had  a  fine  pride  in  him 
self,  was  ever  a  trifle  egotistical,  as  country 
gentlemen  sometimes  become  because  of  their 
insular  situation.  But  he  had  saved  himself  by 
not  becoming  a  mere  pampered  house-dog. 
Hunting  and  kindred  outdoor  delights  had 


INTO  THE  PRIMITIVE  13 

kept  down  the  fat  and  hardened  his  muscles; 
and  to  him,  as  to  the  cold-tubbing  races,  the 
love  of  water  had  been  a  tonic  and  a  health 
preserver. 

And  this  was  the  manner  of  dog  Buck  was 
in  the  fall  of  1897,  when  the  Klondike  strike 
dragged  men  from  all  the  world  into  the  frozen 
North.  But  Buck  did  not  read  the  newspapers, 
and  he  did  not  know  that  Manuel,  one  of  the 
gardener's  helpers,  was  an  undesirable  acquaint 
ance.  Manuel  had  one  besetting  sin.  He 
loved  to  play  Chinese  lottery.  Also,  in  his 
gambling,  he  had  one  besetting  weakness  — 
faith  in  a  system;  and  this  made  his  damnation 
certain.  For  to  play  a  system  requires  money, 
while  the  wages  of  a  gardener's  helper  do  not 
lap  over  the  needs  of  a  wife  and  numerous 
progeny. 

The  Judge  was  at  a  meeting  of  the  Raisin 
Growers'  Association,  and  the  boys  were  busy 
organizing  an  athletic(  club,  on  the  memorable 
night  of  Manuel's  treachery.  No  one  saw  him 
and  Buck  go  off  through  the  orchard  on  what 
Buck  imagined  was  merely  a  stroll.  And  with 


I4  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

the  exception  of  a  solitary  man,  no  one  saw 
them  arrive  at  the  little  flag  station  known  as 
College  Park.  This  man  talked  with  Manuel, 
and  money  chinked  betweei  them. 

"  You  might  wrap  up  the  goods  before  you 
deliver  'm,"  the  stranger  said  gruffly,  and 
Manuel  doubled  a  piece  of  stout  rope  around 
Buck's  neck  under  the  collar. 

"  Twist  it,  an'  you'll  choke  'm  plentee,"  said 
Manuel,  and  the  stranger  grunted  a  ready  af 
firmative. 

Buck  had  accepted  the  rope  with  quiet  dig 
nity.  To  be  sure,  it  was  an  unwonted  perform 
ance:  but  he  had  learned  to  trust  in  men  he 
knew,  and  to  give  them  credit  for  a  wisdom 
that  outreached  his  own.  But  when  the  ends 
of  the  rope  were  placed  in  the  stranger's  hands, 
he  growled  menacingly.  He  had  merely  inti 
mated  his  displeasure,  in  his  pride  believing 
that  to  intimate  was  to  command.  But  to  his 
surprise  the  rope  tightened  around  his  neck, 
shutting  off  his  breath.  In  quick  rage  he 
sprang  at  the  -man,  who  met  him  halfway, 
grappled  him  close  by  the  throat,  and  with  a 


INTO  THE  PRIMITIVE  15 

deft  twist  threw  him  over  on  his  back.  Then 
the  rope  tightened  mercilessly,  while  Buck 
struggled  in  a  fury,  his  tongue  lolling  out  of 
his  mouth  and  his  great  chest  panting  futilely. 
Never  in  all  his  life  had  he  been  so  vilely 
treated,  and  never  in  all  his  life  had  he  been 
so  angry.  But  his  strength  ebbed,  his  eyes 
glazed,  and  he  knew  nothing  when  the  train 
was  flagged  and  the  two  men  thiew  him  into  the 
baggage  car. 

The  next  he  knew,  he  was  dimly  aware  that 
his  tongue  was  hurting  and  that  he  was  being 
jolted  along  in  some  kind  of  a  conveyance. 
The  hoarse  shriek  of  a  locomotive  whistling 
a  crossing  told  him  where  he  was.  He  had 
travelled  too  often  with  the  Judge  not  to  know 
the  sensation  of  riding  in  a  baggage  car.  He 
opened  his  eyes,  and  into  them  came  the 
unbridled  anger  of  a  kidnapped  king.  The 
man  sprang  for  his  throat,  but  Buck  was  too 
quick  for  him.  His  jaws  closed  on  the  hand, 
nor  did  they  relax  till  his  senses  were  choked 
out  of  him  once  more. 

**  Yep,  has  fits,"   the  man   said,   hiding  his 


1 6  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

mangled  hand  from  the  baggageman,  who  had 
been  attracted  by  the  sounds  of  struggle. 
"  I'm  takin'  'm  up  for  the  boss  to  'Frisco. 
A  crack  dog-doctor  there  thinks  that  he  can 


cure  'm." 


Concerning  that  night's  ride,  the  man  spoke 
most  eloquently  for  himself,  in  a  little  shed 
back  of  a  saloon  on  the  San  Francisco  water 
front. 

"All  I  get  is  fifty  for  it,"  he  grumbled; 
"  an'  I  wouldn't  do  it  over  for  a  thousand,  cold 
cash." 

His  hand  was  wrapped  in  a  bloody  hand 
kerchief,  and  the  right  trouser  leg  was  ripped 
from  knee  to  ankle. 

"  How  much  did  the  other  mug  get?"  the 
saloon-keeper  demanded. 

"A  hundred,"  was  the  reply.  "  Wouldn't 
take  a  sou  less,  so  help  me." 

"  That  makes  a  hundred  and  fifty,"  the 
saloon-keeper  calculated;  "  and  he's  worth  it, 
or  I'm  a  squarehead." 

The  kidnapper  undid  the  bloody  wrappings 


INTO  THE  PRIMITIVE  17 

and  looked  at  his  lacerated  hand.     "  If  I  don't 
get  the  hydrophoby  — " 

"  It'll  be  because  you  was  born  to  hang," 
laughed  the  saloon-keeper.  "  Here,  lend  me  a 
hand  before  you  pull  your  freight,"  he  added. 

Dazed,  suffering  intolerable  pain  from 
throat  and  tongue,  with  the  life  half  throttled 
out  of  him,  Buck  attempted  to  face  his  tor 
mentors.  But  he  was  thrown  down  and 
choked  repeatedly,  till  they  succeeded  in  filing 
the  heavy  brass  collar  from  off  his  neck.  Then 
the  robe  was  removed,  and  he  was  flung  into  a 
cagelike  crate. 

There  he  lay  for  the  remainder  of  the  weary 
night,  nursing  his  wrath  and  wounded  pride. 
He  could  not  understand  what  it  all  meant. 
What  did  they  want  with  him,  these  strange 
men?  Why  were  they  keeping  him  pent  up 
in  this  narrow  crate?  He  did  not  know  why,  J 
but  he  felt  oppressed  by  the  vague  sense  of 
impending  calamity.  Several  times  during  the 
night  he  sprang  to  his  feet  when  the  shed  door 
rattled  open,  expecting  to  see  the  Judge,  or  the 


1 8  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

boys  at  least.  But  each  time  it  was  the  bulg 
ing  face  of  the  saloon-keeper  that  peered  in 
at  him  by  the  sickly  light  of  a  tallow  candle. 
And  each  time  the  joyful  bark  that  trembled 
in  Buck's  throat  was  twisted  into  a  savage  growl. 
But  the  saloon-keeper  let  him  alone,  and  in 
the  morning  four  men  entered  and  picked  up 
the  crate.  More  tormentors,  Buck  decided, 
for  they  were  evil-looking  creatures,  ragged 
and  unkempt;  and  he  stormed  and  raged  at 
them  through  the  bars.  They  only  laughed 
and  poked  sticks  at  him,  which  he  promptly 
assailed  with  his  teeth  till  he  realized  that  that 
was  what  they  wanted.  Whereupon  he  lay 
down  sullenly  and  allowed  the  crate  to  be 
lifted  into  a  wagon.  Then  he,  and  the  crate 
in  which  he  was  imprisoned,  began  a  passage 
through  many  lands.  Clerks  in  the  express 
office  took  charge  of  him;  he  was  carted  about 
in  another  wagon;  a  truck  carried  him,  with  an  ; 
assortment  of  boxes  and  parcels,  upon  a  ferry 
steamer;  he  was  trucked  off  the  steamer  into 
a  great  railway  depot,  and  finally  he  was  de 
posited  in  an  express  car. 


INTO  THE  PRIMITIVE  19 

For  two  days  and  nights  this  express  car 
was  dragged  along  at  the  tail  of  shrieking  loco 
motives;  and  for  two  days  and  nights  Buck 
neither  ate  nor  drank.  In  his  anger  he  had 
met  the  first  advances  of  the  express  mes 
sengers  with  growls,  and  they  had  retaliated  by 
teasing  him.  When  he  flung  himself  against 
the  bars,  quivering  and  frothing,  they  laughed 
at  him  and  taunted  him.  They  growled  and 
barked  like  detestable  dogs,  mewed,  and 
flapped  their  arms  and  crowed.  It  was  all  very 
silly,  helcnew;  but  therefore  the  more  outrage 
to  his  dignity,  and  his  anger  waxed  and  waxed. 
He  did  not  mind  the  hunger  so  much,  but 
the  lack  of  water  caused  him  severe  suffering 
and  fanned  his  wrath  to  fever-pitch.  For  that 
matter,  high-strung  and  finely  sensitive,  the  ill 
treatment  had  flung  him  into  a  fever,  which 
was  fed  by  the  inflammation  of  his  parched  and 
swollen  throat  and  tongue. 

He  was  glad  for  one  thing:  the  rope  was 
off  his  neck.  That  had  given  them  an  unfair 
advantage;  but  now  that  it  was  off,  he  would 
show  them.  They  would  never  get  another 


20  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

rope  around  his  neck.  Upon  that  he  was  re 
solved.  For  two  days  and  nights  he  neither 
ate  nor  drank,  and  during  those  two  days  and 
nights  of  torment,  he  accumulated  a  fund  of 
wrath  that  boded  ill  for  whoever  first  fell  foul 
of  him.  His  eyes  turned  blood-shot,  and  he 
was  metamorphosed  into  a  raging  fiend.  So 
changed  was  he  that  the  Judge  himself  would 
/not  jiayc  recognized  him ;  and  the  express 
messengers  breathed  with  relief  when  they  bun 
dled  him  off  the  train  at  Seattle. 

Four  men  gingerly  carried  the  crate  from 
the  wagon  into  a  small,  high-walled  back  yard. 
A  stout  man,  with  a  red  sweater  that  sagged 
generously  at  the  neck,  came  out  and  signed 
the  book  for  the  driver.  That  was  the  man, 
Buck  divined,  the  next  tormentor,  and  he 
hurled  himself  savagely  against  the  bars.  The 
man  smiled  grimly,  and  brought  a  hatchet  and 
a  club. 

"You  ain't  going  to  take  him  out  now?1' 
the  driver  asked. 

"  Sure,"  the  man  replied,  driving  the  hatchet 
into  the  crate  for  a  pry. 


INTO  THE  PRIMITIVE  21 

There  was  an  instantaneous  scattering  of 
the  four  men  who  had  carried  it  in,  and  from 
safe  perches  on  top  the  wall  they  prepared  to 
watch  the  performance. 

Buck  rushed  at  the  splintering  wood,  sink 
ing  his  teeth  into  it,  surging  and  wrestling  with 
it.  Wherever  the  hatchet  fell  on  the  outside, 
he  was  there  on  the  inside,  snarling  and  growl 
ing,  as  furiously  anxious  to  get  out  as  the  man 
in  the  red  sweater  was  calmly  intent  on  getting 
him  out. 

"  Now,  you  red-eyed  devil,"  he  said,  when 
he  had  made  an  opening  sufficient  for  the  pas 
sage  of  Buck's  body.  At  the  same  time  he 
dropped  the  hatchet  and  shifted  the  club  to 
his  right  hand. 

And  Buck  was  truly  a  red-eyed  devil,  as  he 
drew  himself  together  for  the  spring,  hair  bris 
tling,  mouth  foaming,  a  mad  glitter  in  his  blood 
shot  eyes.  Straight  at  the  man  he  launched 
his  one  hundred  and  forty  pounds  of  fury,  sur 
charged  with  the  pent  passion  of  two  days  and 
nights.  In  mid  air,  just  as  his  jaws  were  about 
to  close  on  the  man,  he  received  a  shock  that 


22  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

checked  his  body  and  brought  his  teeth  together 
with  an  agonizing  clip.  He  whirled  over, 
fetching  the  ground  on  his  back  and  side.  He 
had  never  been  struck  by  a  club  in  his  life,  and 
did  not  understand.  With  a  snarl  that  was  part 
bark  and  more  scream  he  was  again  on  his  feet 
and  launched  into  the  air.  And  again  the 
shock  came  and  he  was  brought  crushingly  to 
the  ground.  This  time  he  was  aware  that  it 
was  the  club,  but  his  madness  knew  no  caution. 
A  dozen  times  he  charged,  and  as  often  the 
club  broke  the  charge  and  smashed  him  down. 
After  a  particularly  fierce  blow  he  crawled 
to  his  feet,  too  dazed  to  rush.  He  staggered 
limply  about,  the  blood  flowing  from  nose  and 
mouth  and  ears,  his  beautiful  coat  sprayed  and 
flecked  with  bloody  slaver.  Then  the  man  ad 
vanced  and  deliberately  dealt  him  a  frightful 
blow  on  the  nose.  All  the  pain  he  had  endured 
was  as  nothing  compared  with  the  exquisite 
agony  of  this.  With  a  roar  that  was  almost 
lionlike  in  its  ferocity,  he  again  hurled  himself 
at  the  man.  But  the  man,  shifting  the  club 
from  right  to  left,  coolly  caught  him  by  the 


INTO  THE  PRIMITIVE  23 

under  jaw,  at  the  same  time  wrenching  down 
ward  and  backward.  Buck  described  a  com 
plete  circle  in  the  air,  and  half  of  another,  then 
crashed  to  the  ground  on  his  head  and  chest. 

For  the  last  time  he  rushed.  The  man 
struck  the  shrewd  blow  he  had  purposely  with 
held  for  so  long,  and  Buck  crumpled  up  and 
went  down,  knocked  utterly  senseless. 

"  He's  no  slouch  at  dog-breakin',  that's  wot 
I  say,"  one  of  the  men  on  the  wall  cried  en 
thusiastically. 

"  Druther  break  cayuses  any  day,  and  twice 
on  Sundays,"  was  the  reply  of  the  driver,  as  he 
climbed  on  the  wagon  and  started  the  horses. 

Buck's  senses  came  back  to  him,  but  not  his 
strength.  He  lay  where  he  had  fallen,  and 
from  there  he  watched  the  man  in  the  red 
sweater. 

'  Answers  to  the  name  of  Buck,'  "  the  man 
soliloquized,  quoting  from  the  saloon-keeper's 
letter  which  had  announced  the  consignment 
of  the  crate  and  contents.  "  Well,  Buck,  my 
boy,"  he  went  on  in  a  genial  voice,  "  we've  had 
our  little  ruction,  and  the  best  thing  we  can  do 


24  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

is  to  let  it  go  at  that.  You've  learned  your 
place,  and  I  know  mine.  Be  a  good  dog  and 
all  '11  go  well  and  the  goose  hang  high.  Be  a 
bad  dog,  and  I'll  whale  the  stuffin'  outa  you. 
Understand?" 

As  he  spoke  he  fearlessly  patted  the  head  he 
had  so  mercilessly  pounded,  and  though  Buck's 
hair  involuntarily  bristled  at  touch  of  the  hand, 
he  endured  it  without  protest.  When  the  man 
brought  him  water  he  drank  eagerly,  and  later 
bolted  a  generous  meal  of  raw  meat,  chunk  by 
chunk,  from  the  man's  hand. 

He  was  beaten  (he  knew  that)  ;  but  he  was 
not  broken.  He  saw,  once  for  all,  that  he 
stood  no  chance  against  a  man  with  a  club.  He 
had  learned  the  lesson,  and  in  all  his  after 
life  he  never  forgot  it.  That  club  was  a  reve 
lation.  It  was  his  introduction  to  the  reign  of 
primitive  law,  and  he  met  the  introduction  half 
way.  The  facts  of  life  took  on  a  fiercer  as 
pect;  and  while  he  faced  that  aspect  uncowed, 
he  faced  it  with  all  the  latent  cunning  of  his 
nature  aroused.  As  the  days  went  by,  other 
dogs  came,  in  crates  and  at  the  ends  of  ropes, 


INTO  THE  PRIMITIVE  25 

some  docilely,  and  some  raging  and  roaring  as 
he  had  come;  and,  one  and  all,  he  watched  them 
pass  under  the  dominion  of  the  man  in  the  red 
sweater.  Again  and  again,  as  he  looked  at 
each  brutal  performance,  the  lesson  was  driven 
home  to  Buck;  a  man  with  a  club  was  a  law 
giver,  a  master  to  be  obeyed,  though  not  neces 
sarily  conciliated.  Of  this  last  Buck  was  never 
guilty,  though  he  did  see  beaten  dogs  that 
fawned  upon  the  man,  and  wagged  their  tails, 
and  licked  his  hand.  Also  he  saw  one  dog,  that 
would  neither  conciliate  nor  obey,  finally  killed 
in  the  struggle  for  mastery. 

Now  and  again  men  came,  strangers,  who 
talked  excitedly,  wheedlingly,  and  in  all  kinds 
of  fashions  to  the  man  in  the  red  sweater.  And 
at  such  times  that  money  passed  between  them 
the  strangers  took  one  or  more  of  the  dogs 
away  with  them.  Buck  wondered  where  they 
went,  for  they  never  came  back;  but  the  fear 
of  the  future  was  strong  upon  him,  and  he  was 
glad  each  time  when  he  was  not  selected. 

Yet  his  time  came,  in  the  end,  in  the  form 
of  a  little  weazened  man  who  spat  broken 


26  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

English  and  many  strange  and  uncouth  excla 
mations  which  Buck  could  not  understand. 

"  Sacredam !  "  he  cried,  when  his  eyes  lit 
upon  Buck.  "  Dat  one  dam  bully  dog!  Eh? 
How  moch?  " 

"  Three  hundred,  and  a  present  at  that," 
was  the  prompt  reply  of  the  man  in  the  red 
sweater.  "  And  seein'  it's  government  money, 
you  ain't  got  no  kick  coming,  eh,  Perrault?  " 

Perrault  grinned.  Considering  that  the 
price  of  dogs  had  been  boomed  skyward  by  the 
unwonted  demand,  it  was  not  an  unfair  sum  for 
so  fine  an  animal.  The  Canadian  Government 
would  be  no  loser,  nor  would  its  despatches 
travel  the  slower.  Perrault  knew  dogs,  and 
when  he  looked  at  Buck  he  knew  that  he  was 
one  in  a  thousand  —  "  One  in  ten  t'ousand," 
he  commented  mentally. 

Buck  saw  money  pass  between  them,  and 
was  not  surprised  when  Curly,  a  good-natured 
Newfoundland,  and  he  were  led  away  by  the 
little  weazened  man.  That  was  the  last  he  saw 
of  the  man  in  the  red  sweater,  and  as  Curly 
and  he  looked  at  receding  Seattle  from  the 


INTO  THE  PRIMITIVE  27 

deck  of  the  Narwhal,  it  was  the  last  he  saw  of 
the  warm  Southland.  Curly  and  he  were  taken 
below  by  Perrault  and  turned  over  to  a  black- 
faced  giant  called  Francois.  Perrault  was  a 
French-Canadian,  and  swarthy;  but  Frangois 
was  a  French-Canadian  half-breed,  and  twice  as 
swarthy.  They  were  a  new  kind  of  men  to 
Buck  (of  which  he  was  destined  to  see  many 
more),  and  while  he  developed  no  affection  for 
them,  he  none  the  less  grew  honestly  to  re 
spect  them.  He  speedily  learned  that  Perrault 
and  Francois  were  fair  men,  calm  and  impartial 
in  administering  justice,  and  too  wise  in  the 
way  of  dogs  to  be  fooled  by  dogs. 

In  the  'tween-decks  of  the  Narwhal,  Buck 
and  Curly  joined  two  other  dogs.  One  of 
them  was  a  big,  snow-white  fellow  from 
Spitzbergen  who  had  been  brought  away  by  a 
whaling  captain,  and  who  had  later  accom 
panied  a  Geological  Survey  into  the  Barrens. 

He  was  friendly,  in  a  treacherous  sort  of  way, 
smiling  into  one's  face  the  while  he  meditated 
some  underhand  trick,  as,  for  instance,  when 
he  stole  from  Buck's  food  at  the  first  meal. 


28  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

As  Buck  sprang  to  punish  him,  the  lash  of 
Francois's  whip  sang  through  the  air,  reaching 
the  culprit  first;  and  nothing  remained  to 
Buck  but  to  recover  the  bone.  That  was  fair 
of  Francois,  he  decided,  and  the  half-breed 
began  his  rise  in  Buck's  estimation. 

The  other  dog  made  no  advances,  nor  re 
ceived  any;  also,  he  did  not  attempt  to  steal 
from  the  newcomers.  He  was  a  gloomy, 
morose  fellow,  and  he  showed  Curly  plainly 
that  all  he  desired  was  to  be  left  alone,  and 
further,  that  there  would  be  trouble  if  he  were 
not  left  alone.  "  Dave  "  he  was  called,  and 
he  ate  and  slept,  or  yawned  between  times, 
and  took  interest  in  nothing,  not  even  when 
the  Narwhal  crossed  Queen  Charlotte  Sound 
and  rolled  and  pitched  and  bucked  like  a 
thing  possessed.  When  Buck  and  Curly  grew 
excited,  half  wild  with  fear,  he  raised  his  head 
as  though  annoyed,  favored  them  with  an  in 
curious  glance,  yawned,  and  went  to  sleep 
again. 

Day  and  night  the  ship  throbbed  to  the  tire 
less  pulse  of  the  propeller,  and  though  one 


INTO  THE  PRIMITIVE  29 

day  was  very  like  another,  it  was  apparent  to 
Buck  that  the  weather  was  steadily  growing 
colder.  At  last,  one  morning,  the  propeller 
was  quiet,  and  the  Narwhal  was  pervaded  with 
an  atmosphere  of  excitement.  He  felt  it,  as 
did  the  other  dogs,  and  knew  that  a  change 
was  at  hand.  Francois  leashed  them  and 
brought  them  on  deck.  At  the  first  step 
upon  the  cold  surface,  Buck's  feet  sank  into  a 
white  mushy  something  very  like  mud.  He 
sprang  back  with  a  snort.  More  of  this  white 
stuff  was  falling  through  the  air.  He  shook 
himself,  but  more  of  it  fell  upon  him.  He 
sniffed  it  curiously,  then  licked  some  up  on  his 
tongue.  It  bit  like  fire,  and  the  next  instant 
was  gone.  This  puzzled  him.  He  tried  it 
again,  with  the  same  result.  The  onlookers 
laughed  uproariously,  and  he  felt  ashamed,  he 
knew  not  why,  for  it  was  his  first  snow. 


II 

THE  LAW  OF  CLUB  AND  FANG 


II 

The  Law  of  Club  and  Fang 

UCK'S  first  day  on  the  Dyea  beach 
was  like  a  nightmare.  Every  hour 
was  filled  with  shock  and  surprise.  He 
had  been  suddenly  jerked  from  the  heart  of 
civilization  and  flung  into  the  heart  of  things 
primordial.  No  lazy,  sun-kissed  life  was  this, 
with  nothing  to  do  but  loaf  and  be  bored. 
Here  was  neither  peace,  nor  rest,  nor  a  mo 
ment's  safety.  All  was  confusion  and  action, 
and  every  moment  life  and  limb  were  in  peril. 
There  was  imperative  need  to  be  constantly 
alert;  for  these  dogs  and  men  were  not  town 
dogs  and  men.  They  were  savages,  all  of 
them,  who  knew  no  law  but  the  law  of  club 
and  fang. 

He    had    never    seen    dogs    fight    as    these 
wolfish  creatures  fought,  and  his  first  experi- 

33 


34  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

cnce  taught  him  an  unforgetable  lesson.  It  is 
true,  it  was  a  vicarious  experience,  else  he  would 
not  have  lived  to  profit  by  it.  Curly  was  the 
victim.  They  were  camped  near  the  log  store, 
where  she,  in  her  friendly  way,  made  advances 
to  a  husky  dog  the  size  of  a  full-grown  wolf, 
though  not  half  so  large  as  she.  There  was 
no  warning,  only  a  leap  in  like  a  flash,  a  metallic 
clip  of  teeth,  a  leap  out  equally  swift,  and 
Curly's  face  was  ripped  open  from  eye  to  jaw. 
It  was  the  wolf  manner  of  fighting,  to 
strike  and  leap  away;  but  there  was  more  to  it 
than  this.  Thirty  or  forty  huskies  ran  to  the 
spot  and  surrounded  the  combatants  in  an  in 
tent  and  silent  circle.  Buck  did  not  compre 
hend  that  silent  intentness,  nor  the  eager  way 
with  which  they  were  licking  their  chops. 
Curly  rushed  her  antagonist,  who  struck  again 
and  leaped  aside.  He  met  her  next  rush  with 
his  chest,  in  a  peculiar  fashion  that  tumbled 
her  off  her  feet.  She  never  regained  them. 
This  was  what  the  onlooking  huskies  had  waited 
for.  They  closed  in  upon  her,  snarling  and 
yelping,  and  she  was  buried,  screaming  with 


THE  LAW  OF  CLUB  AND  FANG      35 

agony,   beneath  the  bristling  mass  of  bodies. 

So  sudden  was  it,  and  so  unexpected,  that 
Buck  was  taken  aback.  He  saw  Spitz  run 
out  his  scarlet  tongue  in  a  way  he  had  of  laugh 
ing;  and  he  saw  Francois,  swinging  an  axe, 
spring  into  the  mess  of  dogs.  Three  men  with 
clubs  were  helping  him  to  scatter  them.  Tt  did 
not  take  long.  Two  minutes  from  the  time 
.  Curly  went  down,  the  last  of  her  assailants  were 
clubbed  off.  But  she  lay  there  limp  and  lifeless 
in  the  bloody,  trampled  snow,  almost  literally 
torn  to  pieces,  the  swart  half-breed  standing 
over  her  and  cursing  horribly.  The  scene  often 
came  back  to  Buck  to  trouble  him  in  his  sleep. 
So  that  was  the  way.  No  fairplay.  Once 
down,  that  was  the  end  of  you.  Well,  he  would 
see  to  it  that  he  never  went  down.  Spitz  ran 
out  his  tongue  and  laughed  again,  and  from 
that  moment  Buck  hated  him  with  a  bitter  and 
deathless  hatred. 

Before  he  had  recovered  from  the  shock 
caused  by  the  tragic  passing  of  Curly,  he 
received  another  shock.  Franqois  fastened 
upon  him  an  arrangement  of  straps  and 


36  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

buckles.  It  was  a  harness,  such  as  he  had 
seen  the  grooms  put  on  the  horses  at  home. 
And  as  he  had  seen  horses  work,  so  he  was 
set  to  work,  hauling  Francois  on  a  sled  to  the 
forest  that  fringed  the  valley,  and  returning 
with  a  load  of  firewood.  Though  his  dignity 
was  sorely  hurt  by  thus  being  made  a  draught 
animal,  he  was  too  wise  to  rebel.  He  buckled 
down  with  a  will  and  did  his  best,  though  it  was 
all  new  and  strange.  Francois  was  stern,  de 
manding  instant  obedience,  and  by  virtue  of  his 
whip  receiving  instant  obedience;  while  Dave, 
who  was  an  experienced  wheeler,  nipped  Buck's 
hind  quarters  whenever  he  was  in  error.  Spitz 
was  the  leader,  likewise  experienced,  and  while 
he  could  not  always  get  at  Buck,  he  growled 
sharp  reproof  now  and  again,  or  cunningly 
threw  his  weight  in  the  traces  to  jerk  Buck 
into  the  way  he  should  go.  Buck  learned 
easily,  and  under  the  combined  tuition  of  his 
two  mates  and  Francois  made  remarkable 
progress.  Ere  they  returned  to  camp  he 
knew  enough  to  stop  at  "  ho,"  to  go  ahead 
at  "  mush,"  to  swing  wide  on  the  bends,  and 


THE  LAW  OF  CLUB  AND  FANG      37 

to  keep  clear  of  the  wheeler  when  the  loaded 
sled  shot  downhill  at  their  heels. 

'*  T'ree  vair'  good  dogs,"  Francois  told  Per- 
rault.  "  Dat  Buck,  heem  pool  lak  hell.  I 
tich  heem  queek  as  anyt'ing." 

By  afternoon,  Perrault,  who  was  in  a  hurry 
to  be  on  the  trail  with  his  despatches,  returned 
with  two  more  dogs.  "  Billee  "  and  "  Joe  " 
he  called  them,  two  brothers,  and  true  huskies 
both.  Sons  of  the  one  mother  though  they 
were,  they  were  as  different  as  day  and  night. 
Billee's  one  fault  was  his  excessive  good  nature, 
while  Joe  was  the  very  opposite,  sour  and  in 
trospective,  with  a  perpetual  snarl  and  a  malig 
nant  eye.  Buck  received  them  in  comradely 
fashion,  Dave  ignored  them,  while  Spitz  pro 
ceeded  to  thrash  first  one  and  then  the  other. 
Billee  wagged  his  tail  appeasingly,  turned  to 
run  when  he  saw  that  appeasement  was  of  no 
avail,  and  cried  (still  appeasingly)  when  Spitz's 
sharp  teeth  scored  his  flank.  But  no  matter 
how  Spitz  circled,  Joe  whirled  around  on  his 
heels  to  face  him,  mane  bristling,  ears  laid  back, 
Hps  writhing  and  snarling,  jaws  clipping  to- 


3 8  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

gether  as  fast  as  he  could  snap,  and  eyes  dia 
bolically  gleaming  —  the  incarnation  of  bellig 
erent  fear.  So  terrible  was  his  appearance 
that  Spitz  was  forced  to  forego  disciplining 
him ;  but  to  cover  his  own  discomfiture  he  turned 
upon  the  inoffensive  and  wailing  Billee  and 
drove  him  to  the  confines  of  the  camp. 

By  evening  Perrault  secured  another  dog,  an 
old  husky,  long  and  lean  and  gaunt,  with  a 
battle-scarred  face  and"  a  single  eye  which 
flashed  a  warning  of  prowess  that  commanded 
respect.  He  was  called  Sol-leks,  which  means 
the  Angry  One.  Like  Dave,  he  asked 
nothing,  gave  nothing,  expected  nothing,  and 
when  he  marched  slowly  and  deliberately  into 
their  midst,  even  Spitz  left  him  alone.  He  had 
one  peculiarity  which  Buck  was  unlucky  enough 
to  discover.  He  did  not  like  to  be  approached 
on  his  blind  side.  Of  this  offence  Buck  was 
unwittingly  guilty,  and  the  first  knowledge  he 
had  of  his  indiscretion  was  when  Sol-leks 
whirled  upon  him  and  slashed  his  shoulder  to 
the  bone  for  three  inches  up  and  down.  For 
ever  after  Buck  avoided  his  blind  side,  and  to 


THE  LAW  OF  CLUB  AND  FANG      39 

the  last  of  their  comradeship  had  no  more 
trouble.  His  only  apparent  ambition,  like 
Dave's,  was  to  be  left  alone;  though,  as  Buck 
was  afterward  to  learn,  each  of  them  possessed 
one  other  and  even  more  vital  ambition. 

That  night  Buck  faced  the  great  problem  of 
sleeping.  The  tent,  illumined  by  a  candle, 
glowed  warmly  in  the  midst  of  the  white 
plain;  and  when  he,  as  a  matter  of  course, 
entered  it,  both  Perrault  and  Francois  bom 
barded  him  with  curses  and  cooking  utensils, 
till  he  recovered  from  his  consternation  and 
fled  ignominiously  into  the  outer  cold.  A  chill 
wind  was  blowing  that  nipped  him  sharply  and 
bit  with  especial  venom  into  his  wounded 
shoulder.  He  lay  down  on  the  snow  and  at 
tempted  to  sleep,  but  the  frost  soon  drove  him 
shivering  to  his  feet.  Miserable  and  disconso 
late,  he  wandered  about  among  the  many  tents, 
only  to  find  that  one  place  was  as  cold  as  an 
other.  Here  and  there  savage  dogs  rushed 
upon  him,  but  he  bristled  his  neck-hair  and 
snarled  (for  he  was  learning  fast),  and  they 
let  him  go  his  way  unmolested. 


40  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

Finally  an  idea  came  to  him.  He  would 
return  and  see  how  his  own  team-mates  were 
making  out.  To  his  astonishment,  they  had 
disappeared.  Again  he  wandered  about 
through  the  great  camp,  looking  for  them,  and 
again  he  returned.  Were  they  in  the  tent? 
No,  that  could  not  be,  else  he  would  not  have 
been  driven  out.  Then  where  could  they  pos 
sibly  be?  With  drooping  tail  and  shivering 
body,  very  forlorn  indeed,  he  aimlessly  circled 
the  tent.  Suddenly  the  snow  gave  way  beneath 
his  fore  legs  and  he  sank  down.  Some 
thing  wriggled  under  his  feet.  He  sprang 
back,  bristling  and  snarling,  fearful  of  the  un 
seen  and  unknown.  But  a  friendly  little  yelp 
reassured  him,  and  he  went  back  to  investigate. 
A  whiff  of  warm  air  ascended  to  his  nostrils,  and 
there,  curled  up  under  the  snow  in  a  snug  ball, 
lay  Billee.  He  whined  placatingly,  squirmed 
and  wriggled  to  show  his  good  will  and  inten 
tions,  and  even  ventured,  as  a  bribe  for  peace, 
to  lick  Buck's  face  with  his  warm  wet  tongue. 

Another  lesson.  So  that  was  the  way  they 
did  it,  eh?  Buck  confidently  selected  a  spot, 


THE  LAW  OF  CLUB  AND  FANG      41 

and  with  much  fuss  and  waste  effort  proceeded 
to  dig  a  hole  for  himself.  In  a  trice  the  heat 
from  his  body  filled  the  confined  space  and 
he  was  asleep.  The  day  had  been  long  and 
arduous,  and  he  slept  soundly  and  comfortably, 
though  he  growled  and  barked  and  wrestled 
with  bad  dreams. 

Nor  did  he  open  his  eyes  till  roused  by  the 
noises  of  the  waking  camp.  At  first  he  did 
not  know  where  he  was.  It  had  snowed  dur 
ing  the  night  and  he  was  completely  buried. 
The  snow  walls  pressed  him  on  every  side,  and 
a  great  surge  of  fear  swept  through  him  —  the 
fear  of  the  wild  thing  for  the  trap.  It  was  a 
token  that  he  was  harking  back  through  his  own 
life  to  the  lives  of  his  forbears;  for  he  was  a 
civilized  dog,  an  unduly  civilized  dog  and  of 
his  own  experience  knew  no  trap  and  so  could 
not  of  himself  fear  it.  The  muscles  of  his 
whole  body  contracted  spasmodically  and  in 
stinctively,  the  hair  on  his  neck  and  shoulders 
stood  on  end,  and  with  a  ferocious  snarl  he 
bounded  straight  up  into  the  blinding  day,  the 
snow  flying  about  him  in  a  flashing  cloud.  Ere 


42      k      THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

he  landed  on  his  feet,  he  saw  the  white  camp 
spread  out  before  him  and  knew  where  he  was 
and  remembered  all  that  had  passed  from  the 
time  he  went  for  a  stroll  with  Manuel  to  the 
hole  he  had  dug  for  himself  the  night  before. 

A  shout  from  Francois  hailed  his  appear 
ance.  "  Wot  I  say?  "  the  dog-driver  cried  to 
Perrault.  "  Dat  Buck  for  sure  learn  queek  as 
anyt'ing." 

Perrault  nodded  gravely.  As  courier  for 
the  Canadian  Government,  bearing  important 
despatches,  he  was  anxious  to  secure  the  best 
dogs,  and  he  was  particularly  gladdened  by  the 
possession  of  Buck. 

Three  more  huskies  were  added  to  the  team 
inside  an  hour,  making  a  total  of  nine,  and 
before  another  quarter  of  an  hour  had  passed 
they  were  in  harness  and  swinging  up  the  trail 
toward  the  Dyea  Canon.  Buck  was  glad  to  be 
gone,  and  though  the  work  was  hard  he  found 
he  did  not  particularly  despise  it.  He  was  sur 
prised  at  the  eagerness  which  animated  the 
whole  team  and  which  was  communicated  to 
him;  but  still  more  surprising  was  the  change 


THE  LAW  OF  CLUB  AND  FANG      43 

wrought-in  Dave  and  Sol-leks.  They  were  new 
dogs,  utterly  transformed  by  the  harness.  All 
passiveness  and  unconcern  had  dropped  from 
them.  They  were  alert  and  active,  anxious  that 
the  work  should  go  well,  and  fiercely  irritable 
with  whatever,  by  delay  or  confusion,  retarded 
that  work.  The  toil  of  the  traces  seemed  the 
supreme  expression  of  their  being,  and  all  that 
they  lived  for  and  the  only  thing  in  which  they 
took  delight. 

Dave  was  wheeler  or  sled  dog,  pulling  in 
front  of  him  was  Buck,  then  came  Sol-leks; 
the  rest  of  the  team  was  strung  out  ahead, 
single  file,  to  the  leader,  which  position  was 
filled  by  Spitz. 

Buck  had  been  purposely  placed  between 
Dave  and  Sol-leks  so  that  he  might  receive  in 
struction.  Apt  scholar  that  he  was,  they  were 
equally  apt  teachers,  never  allowing  him  to 
linger  long  in  error,  and  enforcing  their  teach 
ing  with  their  sharp  teeth.  Dave  was  fair  and 
very  wise.  He  never  nipped  Buck  without 
cause,  and  he  never  failed  to  nip  him  when 
he  stood  in  need  of  it.  As  Francois's  whip 


44  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

backed  him  up,  Buck  found  it  to  be  cheaper  to 
mend  his  ways  than  to  retaliate.  Once,  during 
a  brief  halt,  when  he  got  tangled  in  the  traces 
and  delayed  the  start,  both  Dave  and  Sol-leks 
flew  at  him  and  administered  a  sound  trounc 
ing.  The  resulting  tangle  was  even  worse,  but 
Buck  took  good  care  to  keep  the  traces  clear 
thereafter;  and  ere  the  day  was  done,  so  well 
had  he  mastered  his  work,  his  mates  about 
ceased  nagging  him.  Francois's  whip  snapped 
less  frequently,  and  Perrault  even  honored  Buck 
by  lifting  up  his  feet  and  carefully  examining 
them. 

It  was  a  hard  day's  run,  up  the  Canon, 
through  Sheep  Camp,  past  the  Scales  and  the 
timber  line,  across  glaciers  and  snowdrifts  hun 
dreds  of  feet  deep,  and  over  the  great  Chilcoot 
Divide,  which  stands  between  the  salt  water  and 
the  fresh  and  guards  forbiddingly  the  sad  and 
lonely  North.  They  made  good  time  down  the 
chain  of  lakes  which  fills  the  craters  of  extinct 
volcanoes,  and  late  that  night  pulled  into  the 
huge  camp  at  the  head  of  Lake  Bennett,  where 
thousands  of  goldseekers  were  building  boats 


THE  LAW  OF  CLUB  AND  FANG      45 

against  the  break-up  of  the  ice  in  the  spring. 
Buck  made  his  hole  in  the  snow  and  slept  the 
sleep  of  the  exhausted  just,  but  all  too  early  was 
routed  out  in  the  cold  darkness  and  harnessed 
with  his  mates  to  the  sled. 

That  day  they  made  forty  miles,  the  trail 
being  packed;  but  the  next  day,  and  for  many 
days  to  follow,  they  broke  their  own  trail, 
worked  harder,  and  made  poorer  time.  As  a 
rule,  Perrault  travelled  ahead  of  the  team,  pack 
ing  the  snow  with  webbed  shoes  to  make  it 
easier  for  them.  Francois,  guiding  the  sled  at 
the  gee-pole,  sometimes  exchanged  places  with 
him,  but  not  often.  Perrault  was  in  a  hurry, 
and  he  prided  himself  on  his  knowledge  of  ice, 
which  knowledge  was  indispensable,  for  the  fall 
ice  was  very  thin,  and  where  there  was  swift 
water,  there  was  no  ice  at  all. 

Day  after  day,  for  days  unending,  Buck 
toiled  in  the  traces.  Always,  they  broke  camp 
in  the  dark,  and  the  first  gray  of  dawn  found 
them  hitting  the  trail  with  fresh  miles  reeled 
off  behind  them.  And  always  they  pitched 
camp  after  dark,  eating  their  bit  of  fish,  and 


46  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

crawling  to  sleep  into  the  snow.  Buck  was 
ravenous.  The  pound  and  a  half  of  sun- 
dried  salmon,  which  was  his  ration  for  each 
day,  seemed  to  go  nowhere.  He  never  had 
enough,  and  suffered  from  perpetual  hunger 
pangs.  Yet  the  other  dogs,  because  they 
weighed  less  and  were  born  to  the  life,  re 
ceived  a  pound  only  of  the  fish  and  managed 
to  keep  in  good  condition. 

He  swiftly  lost  the  fastidiousness  which  had 
characterized  his  old  life.  A  dainty  eater,  he 
found  that  his  mates,  finishing  first,  robbed  him 
of  his  unfinished  ration.  There  was  no  defend 
ing  it.  While  he  was  fighting  off  two  or  three, 
it  was  disappearing  down  the  throats  of  the 
others.  To  remedy  this,  he  ate  as  fast  as  they, 
and,  so  greatly  did  hunger  compel  him,  he  was 
not  above  taking  what  did  not  belong  to  him. 
He  watched  and  learned.  When  he  saw  Pike, 
one  of  the  new  dogs,  a  clever  malingerer  and 
thief,  slyly  steal  a  slice  of  bacon  when  Per- 
rault's  back  was  turned,  he  duplicated  the  per 
formance  the  following  day,  getting  away  with 
the  whole  chunk.  A  great  uproar  was  raised, 


THE  LAW  OF  CLUB  AND  FANG      47 

but  he  was  unsuspected,  while  Dub,  an  awkward 
blunderer  who  was  always  getting  caught,  was 
punished  for  Buck's  misdeed. 

This  first  theft  marked  Buck  as  fit  to  sur 
vive  in  the  hostile  Northland  environment.  It 
marked  his  adaptability,  his  capacity  to  adjust 
himself  to  changing  conditions,  the  lack  of 
which  would  have  meant  swift  and  terrible 
death.  It  marked,  further,  the  decay  or  going 
to  pieces  of  his  moral  nature,  a  vain  thing  and 
a  handicap  in  the  ruthless  struggle  for  existence. 
It  was  all  well  enough  in  the  Southland,  under 
the  law  of  love  and  fellowship,  to  respect  pri 
vate  property  and  personal  feelings;  but  in  the 
Northland,  under  the  law  of  club  and  fang, 
whoso  took  such  things  into  account  was  a  fool, 
and  in  so  far  as  he  observed  them  he  would  fail 
to  prosper. 

Not  that  Buck  reasoned  it  out.  He  was 
fit,  that  was  all,  and  unconsciously  he  accom 
modated  himself  to  the  new  mode  of  life.  All 
his  days,  no  matter  what  the  odds,  he  had 
never  run  from  a  fight.  But  the  club  of  the 
man  in  the  red  sweater  had  beaten  into  him 


48  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

a  more  fundamental  and  primitive  code.  Civil 
ized,  he  could  have  died  for  a  moral  considera 
tion,  say  the  defence  of  Judge  Miller's  riding- 
whip,  but  the  completeness  of  his  decivilization 
was  now  evidenced  by  his  ability  to  flee  from 
the  defence  of  a  moral  consideration  and  so 
save  his  hide.  He  did  not  steal  for  joy  of  it, 
but  because  of  the  clamor  of  his  stomach.  He 
did  not  rob  openly,  but  stole  secretly  and  cun 
ningly,  out  of  respect  for  club  and  fang.  In 
short,  the  things  he  did  were  done  because  it 
was  easier  to  do  them  than  not  to  do  them. 

His  development  (or  retrogression)  was 
rapid.  His  muscles  became  hard  as  iron,  and 
he  grew  callous  to  all  ordinary  pain.  He 
achieved  an  internal  as  well  as  external  econ 
omy.  He  could  eat  anything,  no  matter  how 
loathsome  or  indigestible,  and,  once  eaten,  the 
juices  of  his  stomach  extracted  the  last  least 
particle  of  nutriment;  and  his  blood  carried  it 
to  the  farthest  reaches  of  his  body  building  it 
into  the  toughest  and  stoutest  of  tissues.  Sight 
and  scent  became  remarkably  keen,  while  his 
hearing  developed  such  acuteness  that  in  his 


THE  LAW  OF  CLUB  AND  FANG      49 

sleep  he  heard  the  faintest  sound  and  knew 
whether  it  heralded  peace  or  peril.  He  learned 
to  bite  the  ice  out  with  his  teeth  when  it  col 
lected  between  his  toes;  and  when  he  was  thirsty 
and  there  was  a  thick  scum  of  ice  over  the  water 
hole,  he  would  break  it  by  rearing  and  striking 
it  with  stiff  fore  legs.  His  most  conspicuous 
trait  was  an  ability  to  scent  the  wind  and  fore 
cast  it  a  night  in  advance.  No  matter  how 
breathless  the  air  when  he  dug  his  nest  by  tree 
or  bank,  the  wind  that  later  blew  inevitably 
found  him  to  leeward,  sheltered  and  snug. 

And  not  only  did  he  learn  by  experience,  but 
instincts  long  dead  became  alive  again.  The 
domesticated  generations  fell  from  him.  In 
vague  ways  he  remembered  back  to  the  youth 
of  the  breed,  to  the  time  the  wild  dogs  ranged 
in  packs  through  the  primeval  forest  and  killed 
their  meat  as  they  ran  it  down.  It  was  no  task 
for  him  to  learn  to  fight  with  cut  and  slash 
and  the  quick  wolf  snap.  In  this  manner  had 
fought  forgotten  ancestors.  They  quickened 
the  old  life  within  him,  and  the  old  tricks  which 
they  had  stamped  into  the  heredity  of  the  breed 


50  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

were  his  tricks.  They  came  to  him  without 
effort  or  discovery,  as  though  they  had  been  his 
always.  And  when,  on  the  still  cold  nights,  he 
pointed  his  nose  at  a  star  and  howled  long  and 
wolflike,  it  was  his  ancestors,  dead  and  dust, 
pointing  nose  at  star  and  howling  down 
through  the  centuries  and  through  him.  And 
his  cadences  were  their  cadences,  the  cadences 
which  voiced  their  woe  and  what  to  them  was 
the  ^meaning  of  the  stillness,  and  the  cold,  and 
dark. 

Thus,  as  token  of  what  a  puppet  thing  life  is, 
the  ancient  song  surged  through  him  and  he 
came  into  his  own  again;  and  he  came  because 
men  had  found  a  yellow  metal  in  the  North, 
and  because  Manuel  was  a  gardener's  helper 
whose  wages  did  not  lap  over  the  needs  of  his 
wife  and  divers  small  copies  of  himself. 


Ill 


THE  DOMINANT  PRIMORDIAL 
BEAST 


Ill 

The  Dominant  Primordial  Beast 

THE  dominant  primordial  beast  was 
strong  in  Buck,  and  under  the  fierce 
conditions  of  trail  life  it  grew  and 
grew.  Yet  it  was  a  secret  growth.  His  new 
born  cunning  gave  him  poise  and  control.  He 
was  too  busy  adjusting  himself  to  the  new  life 
to  feel  at  ease,  and  not  only  did  he  not  pick 
fights,  but  he  avoided  them  whenever  possible. 
A  certain  deliberateness  characterized  his  atti 
tude.  He  was  not  prone  to  rashness  and  pre 
cipitate  action;  and  in  the  bitter  hatred  between 
him  and  Spitz  he  betrayed  no  impatience, 
shunned  all  offensive  acts. 

On  the  other  hand,  possibly  because  he 
divined  in  Buck  a  dangerous  rival,  Spitz,  never 
lost  an  opportunity  of  showing  his  teeth.  He 

53 


54  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

even  went  out  of  his  way  to  bully  Buck,  striv 
ing  constantly  to  start  the  fight  which  could  end 
only  in  the  death  of  one  or  the  other. 

Early  in  the  trip  this  might  have  taken  place 
had  it  not  been  for  an  unwonted  accident.  At 
the  end  of  this  day  they  made  a  bleak  and 
miserable  camp  on  the  shore  of  Lake  Le  Barge. 
Driving  snow,  a  wind  that  cut  like  a  white-hot 
knife,  and  darkness,  had  forced  them  to  grope 
for  a  camping  place.  They  could  hardly  have 
fared  worse.  At  their  backs  rose  a  perpen 
dicular  wall  of  rock,  and  Perrault  and  Fran- 
c.ois  were  compelled  to  make  their  fire  and 
spread  their  sleeping  robes  on  the  ice  of  the 
lake  itself.  The  tent  they  had  discarded  at 
Dyea  in  order  to  travel  light.  A  few  sticks  of 
driftwood  furnished  them  with  a  fire  that 
thawed  down  through  the  ice  and  left  them  to 
eat  supper  in  the  dark. 

Close  in  under  the  sheltering  rock  Buck  made 
his  nest.  So  snug  and  warm  was  it,  that  he 
was  loath  to  leave  it  when  Francois  distributed 
the  fish  which  he  had  first  thawed  over  the  fire. 
But  when  Buck  finished  his  ration  and  returned, 


DOMINANT  PRIMORDIAL  BEAST      55 

he  found  his  nest  occupied.  A  warning  snarl 
told  him  that  the  trespasser  was  Spitz.  Till 
now  Buck  had  avoided  trouble  with  his  enemy, 
but  this  was  too  much.  The  beast  in  him 
roared.  He  sprang  upon  Spitz  with  a  fury 
which  surprised  them  both,  and  Spitz  particu 
larly,  for  his  whole  experience  with  Buck  had 
gone  to  teach  him  that  his  rival  was  an  unusu 
ally  timid  dog,  who  managed  to  hold  his  own 
only  because  of  his  great  weight  and  size. 

Frangois  was  surprised,  too,  when  they  shot 
out  in  a  tangle  from  the  disrupted  nest  and  he 
divined  the  cause  of  the  trouble.  "  A-a-ah !  " 
he  cried  to  Buck.  "  Gif  it  to  heem,  by  Gar! 
Gif  it  to  heem,  the  dirty  t'eef !  " 

Spitz  was  equally  willing.  He  was  crying 
with  sheer  rage  and  eagerness  as  he  circled  back 
and  forth  for  a  chance  to  spring  in.  Buck  was 
no  less  eager,  and  no  less  cautious  as  he  like 
wise  circled  back  and  forth  for  the  advantage. 
But  it  was  then  that  the  unexpected  happened, 
the  thing  which  projected  their  struggle  for  su 
premacy  far  into  the  future,  past  many  a  weary 
mile  of  trail  and  toil. 


56  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

An  oath  from  Perrault,  the  resounding  im 
pact  of  a  club  upon  a  bony  frame,  and  a  shrill 
yelp  of  pain,  heralded  the  breaking  forth  of 
pandemonium.  The  camp  was  suddenly  dis 
covered  to  be  alive  with  skulking  furry  forms, 
—  starving  huskies,  four  or  five  score  of  them, 
who  had  scented  the  camp  from  some  Indian 
village.  They  had  crept  in  while  Buck  and 
Spitz  were  fighting,  and  when  the  two  men 
sprang  among  them  with  stout  clubs  they 
showed  their  teeth  and  fought  back.  They 
were  crazed  by  the  smell  of  the  food.  Per 
rault  found  one  with  head  buried  in  the  grub- 
box.  His  club  landed  heavily  on  the  gaunt  ribs, 
and  the  grub-box  was  capsized  on  the  ground. 
On  the  instant  a  score  of  the  famished  brutes 
were  scrambling  for  the  bread  and  bacon.  The 
clubs  fell  upon  them  unheeded.  They  yelped 
and  howled  under  the  rain  of  blows,  but  strug 
gled  none  the  less  madly  till  the  last  crumb  had 
been  devoured. 

In  the  meantime  the  astonished  team-dogs 
had  burst  out  of  their  nests  only  to  be  set  upon 
by  the  fierce  invaders.  Never  had  Buck  seen 


DOMINANT  PRIMORDIAL  BEAST      57 

such  dogs.  It  seemed  as  though  their  bones 
would  burst  through  their  skins.  They  were 
mere  skeletons,  draped  loosely  in  draggled 
hides,  with  blazing  eyes  and  slavered  fangs. 
But  the  hunger-madness  made  them  terrifying, 
irresistible.  There  was  no  opposing  them. 
The  team-dogs  were  swept  back  against  the  cliff 
at  the  first  onset.  Buck  was  beset  by  three 
huskies,  and  in  a  trice  his  head  and  shoulders 
were  ripped  and  slashed.  The  din  was  fright 
ful.  Billee  was  crying  as  usual.  Dave  and 
Sol-leks,  dripping  blood  from  a  score  of  wounds, 
were  fighting  bravely  side  by  side.  Joe  was 
snapping  like  a  demon.  Once,  his  teeth  closed 
on  the  fore  leg  of  a  husky,  and  he  crunched 
down  through  the  bone.  Pike,  the  malingerer, 
leaped  upon  the  crippled  animal,  breaking  its 
neck  with  a  quick  flash  of  teeth  and  a  jerk. 
Buck  got  a  frothing  adversary  by  the  throat, 
and  was  sprayed  with  blood  when  his  teeth  sank 
through  the  jugular.  The  warm  taste  of  it  in 
his  mouth  goaded  him  to  greater  fierceness. 
He  flung  himself  upon  another,  and  at  the  same 
time  felt  teeth  sink  into  his  own  throat.  It 


5 8  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

was  Spitz,  treacherously  attacking  from  the 
side. 

Perrault  and  Frangois,  having  cleaned  out 
their  part  of  the  camp,  hurried  to  save  their 
sled-dogs.  The  wild  wave  of  famished  beasts 
rolled  back  before  them,  and  Buck  shook  him 
self  free.  But  it  was  only  for  a  moment.  The 
two  men  were  compelled  to  run  back  to  save  the 
grub  upon  which  the  huskies  returned  to  the 
attack  on  the  team.  Billee,  terrified  into 
bravery,  sprang  through  the  savage  circle  and 
fled  away  over  the  ice.  Pike  and  Dub  followed 
on  his  heels,  with  the  rest  of  the  team  behind. 
As  Buck  drew  himself  together  to  spring  after 
them,  out  of  the  tail  of  his  eye  he  saw  Spitz 
rush  upon  him  with  the  evident  intention  of 
overthrowing  him.  Once  off  his  feet  and  un 
der  that  mass  of  huskies,  there  was  no  hope  for 
him.  But  he  braced  himself  to  the  shock  of 
Spitz's  charge,  then  joined  the  flight  out  on  the 
lake. 

Later,  ;he  nine  team-dogs  gathered  together 
and  sought  shelter  in  the  forest.  Though 
unpursued,  they  \vere  in  a  sorry  plight.  There 


DOMINANT  PRIMORDIAL  BEAST      59 

was  not  one  who  was  not  wounded  in  four  or 
five  places,  while  some  were  wounded  griev 
ously.  Dub  was  badly  injured  in  a  hind  leg; 
Dolly,  the  last  husky  added  to  the  team  at 
Dyea,  had  a  badly  torn  throat;  Joe  had  lost 
an  eye;  while  Billee,  the  good-natured,  with 
an  ear  chewed  and  rent  to  ribbons,  cried  and 
whimpered  throughout  the  night.  At  day 
break  they  limped  warily  back  to  camp,  to  find 
the  marauders  gone  and  the  two  men  in  bad 
tempers.  Fully  half  their  grub  supply  was 
gone.  The  huskies  had  chewed  through  the 
sled  lashings  and  canvas  coverings.  In  fact, 
nothing,  no  matter  how  remotely  eatable,  had 
escaped  them.  They  had  eaten  a  pair  of  Per- 
rault's  moose-hide  moccasins,  chunks  out  of  the 
leather  traces,  and  even  two  feet  of  lash  from 
the  end  of  Francois's  whip.  He  broke  from 
a  mournful  contemplation  of  it  to  look  over 
his  wounded  dogs. 

"  Ah,  my  frien's,"  he  said  softly,  "  mebbe  it 
mek  you  mad  dog,  dose  many  bites.  Mebbe 
all  mad  dog,  sacredam!  Wot  you  t'ink,  eh, 
Perrault?" 


60  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

The  courier  shook  his  head  dubiously.  With 
four  hundred  miles  of  trail  still  between  him 
and  Dawson,  he  could  ill  afford  to  have  mad 
ness  break  out  among  his  dogs.  Two  hours  of 
cursing  and  exertion  got  the  harnesses  into 
shape,  and  the  wound-stiffened  team  was  under 
way,  struggling  painfully  over  the  hardest  part 
of  the  trail  they  had  yet  encountered,  and  for 
that  matter,  the  hardest  between  them  and 
Dawson. 

The  Thirty  Mile  River  was  wide  open.  Its 
wild  water  defied  the  frost,  and  it  was  in  the 
eddies  only  and  in  the  quiet  places  that  the 
ice  held  at  all.  Six  days  of  exhausting  toil 
were  required  to  cover  those  thirty  terrible 
miles.  And  terrible  they  were,  for  every  foot 
of  them  was  accomplished  at  the  risk  of  life 
to  dog  and  man.  A  dozen  times,  Perrault, 
nosing  the  way,  broke  through  the  ice  bridges, 
being  saved  by  the  long  pole  he  carried,  which 
he  so  held  that  it  fell  each  time  across  the  hole 
made  by  his  body.  But  a  cold  snap  was  on, 
the  thermometer  registering  fifty  below  zero, 
and  each  time  he  broke  through  he  was  com- 


DOMINANT  PRIMORDIAL  BEAST      61 

pelled  for  very  life  to  build  a  fire  and  dry  his 
garments. 

Nothing  daunted  him.  It  was  because 
nothing  daunted  him  that  he  had  been  chosen 
for  government  courier.  He  took  all  manner 
of  risks,  resolutely  thrusting  his  little  weazened 
face  into  the  frost  and  struggling  on  from  dim 
dawn  to  dark.  He  skirted  the  frowning  shores 
on  rim  ice  that  bent  and  crackled  under  foot 
and  upon  which  they  dared  not  halt.  Once,  the 
sled  broke  through,  with  Dave  and  Buck,  and 
they  were  half-frozen  and  all  but  drowned  by 
the  time  they  were  dragged  out.  The  usual 
fire  was  necessary  to  save  them.  They  were 
coated  solidly  with  ice,  and  the  two  men  kept 
them  on  the  run  around  the  fire,  sweating  and 
thawing,  so  close  that  they  were  singed  by  the 
flames. 

At  another  time  Spitz  went  through,  drag 
ging  the  whole  team  after  him  up  to  Buck, 
who  strained  backward  with  all  his  strength, 
his  fore  paws  on  the  slippery  edge  and  the  ice 
quivering  and  snapping  all  around.  But  behind 
him  was  Dave,  likewise  straining  backward, 


62  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

and  behind  the  sled  was  Francois,  pulling  till 
his  tendons  cracked. 

Again,  the  rim  ice  broke  away  before  and 
behind,  and  there  was  no  escape  except  up  the 
cliff.  Perrault  scaled  it  by  a  miracle,  while 
Francois  prayed  for  just  that  miracle;  and  with 
every  thong  and  sled  lashing  and  the  last  bit 
of  harness  rove  into  a  long  rope,  the  dogs 
were  hoisted,  one  by  one,  to  the  cliff  crest. 
Francois  came  up  last,  after  the  sled  and  load. 
Then  came  the  search  for  a  place  to  descend, 
which  descent  was  ultimately  made  by  the  aid  of 
the  rope,  and  night  found  them  back  on  the 
river  with  a  quarter  of  a  mile  to  the  day's  credit. 

By  the  time  they  made  the  Hootalinqua  and 
good  ice,  Buck  was  played  out.  The  rest  of 
the  dogs  were  in  like  condition;  but  Perrault, 
to  make  up  lost  time,  pushed  them  late  and 
early.  The  first  day  they  covered  thirty-five 
miles  to  ^he  Big  Salmon ;  the  next  day  thirty-five 
more  to  the  Little  Salmon;  the  third  day  forty 
miles,  which  brought  them  well  up  toward  the 
Five  Fingers. 

Buck's  feet  were  not  so  compact  and  hard 


DOMINANT  PRIMORDIAL  BEAST      63 

as  the  feet  of  the  huskies.  His  had  softened 
during  the  many  generations  since  the  day  his 
last  wild  ancestor  was  tamed  by  a  cave-dweller 
or  river  man.  All  day  long  he  limped  in  agony, 
and  camp  once  made,  lay  down  like  a  dead  dog. 
Hungry  as  he  was,  he  would  not  move  to  receive 
his  ration  of  fish,  which  Francois  had  to  bring 
to  him.  Also,  the  dog-driver  rubbed  Buck's 
feet  for  half  an  hour  each  night  after  supper, 
and  sacrificed  the  tops  of  his  own  moccasins 
to  make  four  moccasins  for  Buck.  This  was  a 
great  relief,  and  Buck  caused  even  the  weazened 
face  of  Perrault  to  twist  itself  into  a  grin  one 
morning,  when  Francois  forgot  the  moccasins 
and  Buck  lay  on  his  back,  his  four  feet  waving 
appealingly  in  the  air,  and  refused  to  budge 
without  them.  Later  his  feet  grew  hard  to  the 
trail,  and  the  worn-out  foot-gear  was  thrown 
away. 

At  the  Pelly  one  morning,  as  they  were  har 
nessing  up,  Dolly,  who  had  never  been  con 
spicuous  for  anything,  went  suddenly  mad. 
She  announced  her  condition  by  a  long,  heart- 
breaking  wolf  howl  that  sent  every  dog  bris- 


64  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

tling  with  fear,  then  sprang  straight  for  Buck. 
He  had  never  seen  a  dog  go  mad,  nor  did  he 
have  any  reason  to  fear  madness;  yet  he  knew 
that  here  was  horror,  and  fled  away  from  it  in  a 
panic.  Straight  away  he  raced,  with  Dolly, 
panting  and  frothing,  one  leap  behind;  nor 
could  she  gain  on  him,  so  great  was  his  terror, 
nor  could  he  leave  her,  so  great  was  her  mad 
ness.  He  plunged  through  the  wooded  breast 
of  the  island,  flew  down  to  the  lower  end, 
crossed  a  back  channel  filled  with  rough  ice 
to  another  island,  gained  a  third  island,  curbed 
back  to  the  main  river,  and  in  desperation 
started  to  cross  it.  And  all  the  time,  though 
he  did  not  look,  he  could  hear  her  snarling 
just  one  leap  behind.  Francois  called  to  him 
a  quarter  of  a  mile  away  and  he  doubled  back, 
still  one  leap  ahead,  gasping  painfully  for  air 
and  putting  all  his  faith  in  that  Francois  would 
save  him.  The  dog-driver  held  the  axe  poised 
in  his  hand,  and  as  Buck  shot  past  him  the  axe 
crashed  down  upon  mad  Dolly's  head. 

Buck  staggered  over  against  the   sled,   ex 
hausted,   sobbing   for  breath,   helpless.     This 


DOMINANT  PRIMORDIAL  BEAST     65 

was  Spitz's  opportunity.  He  sprang  upon 
Buck,  and  twice  his  teeth  sank  into  his  unre 
sisting  foe  and  ripped  and  tore  the  flesh  to  the 
bone.  Then  Francois'  lash  descended,  and 
Buck  had  the  satisfaction  of  watching  Spitz 
receive  the  worst  whipping  as  yet  administered 
to  any  of  the  team. 

"  One  devil,  dat  Spitz,"  remarked  Perrault. 
"  Some  dam  day  heem  keel  dat  Buck." 

;i  Dat  Buck  two  devils,"  was  Francois's  re 
joinder.  "  All  de  tarn  I  watch  dat  Buck  I  know 
for  sure.  Lissen :  some  dam  fine  day  heem  get 
mad  lak  hell  an'  den  heem  chew  dat  Spitz  all 
up  an'  spit  heem  out  on  de  snow.  Sure.  I 
know." 

From  then  on  it  was  war  between  them. 
Spitz,  as  lead-dog  and  acknowledged  master  o' 
the  team,  felt  his  supremacy  threatened*  ^y  this 
strange  Southland  dog.  And  strange  Buck  was 
co  him,  for  of  the  many  Southland  dogs  he 
had  known,  not  one  had  shown  up  worthily  in 
camp  and  on  trail.  They  were  all  too  soft, 
dying  under  the  toil,  the  frost,  and  starvation. 
Buck  was  the  exception.  He  alone  endured 


66  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

and  prospered,  matching  the  husky  in  strength, 
savagery,  and  cunning.  Then  he  was  a  mas 
terful  dog,  and  what  made  him  dangerous  was 
the  fact  that  the  club  of  the  man  in  the  red 
sweater  had  knocked  all  blind  pluck  and  rash 
ness  out  of  his  desire  for  mastery.  He  was 
preeminently  cunning,  and  could  bide  his  time 
with  a  patience  that  was  nothing  less  than 
primitive. 

It  was  inevitable  that  the  clash  for  lead 
ership  should  come.  Buck  wanted  it.  He 
wanted  it  because  it  was  his  nature,  because 
he  had  been  gripped  tight  by  that  nameless, 
incomprehensible  pride  of  the  trail  and  trace 
—  that  pride  which  holds  dogs  in  the  toil  to  the 
last  gasp,  which  lures  them  to  die  joyfully  in 
the  harness,  and  breaks  their  hearts  if  they  are 
cut  out  of  the  harness.  This  was  the  pride  of 
Dave  as  wheel-dog,  of  Sol-leks  as  he  pulled 
with  all  his  strength;  the  pride  that  laid  hold 
of  them  at  break  of  camp,  transforming  them 
from  sour  and  sullen  brutes  into  straining, 
eager,  ambitious  creatures;  the  pride  that 
spurred  them  on  all  day  and  dropped  them  at 


DOMINANT  PRIMORDIAL  BEAST      67 

pitch  of  camp  at  night,  letting  them  fall  back 
into  gloomy  unrest  and  uncontent.  This  was 
the  pride  that  bore  up  Spitz  and  made  him 
thrash  the  sled-dogs  who  blundered  and  shirked 
in  the  traces  or  hid  away  at  harness-up  time  in 
the  morning.  Likewise  it  was  this  pride  that 
made  him  fear  Buck  as  a  possible  lead-dog. 
And  this  was  Buck's  pride,  too. 

He  openly  threatened  the  other's  leadership. 
He  came  between  him  and  the  shirks  he  should 
have  punished.  And  he  did  it  deliberately. 
One  night  there  was  a  heavy  snowfall,  and  in 
the  morning  Pike,  the  malingerer,  did  not  ap 
pear.  He  was  securely  hidden  in  his  nest  under 
a  foot  of  snow.  Franqois  called  him  and 
sought  him  in  vain.  Spitz  was  wild  with  wrath. 
He  raged  through  the  camp,  smelling  and  dig 
ging  in  every  likely  place,  snarling  so  fright 
fully  that  Pike  heard  and  shivered  in  his  hiding- 
place. 

But  when  he  was  at  last  unearthed,  and  Spitz 
flew  at  him  to  punish  him,  Buck  flew  with  equal 
rage,  in  between.  So  unexpected  was  it,  and  so 
shrewdly  managed,  that  Spitz  was  hurled  back- 


68  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

ward  and  off  his  feet.  Pike,  who  had  been 
trembling  abjectly,  took  heart  at  this  open  mu 
tiny,  and  sprang  upon  his  overthrown  leader. 
Buck,  to  whom  fairplay  was  a  forgotten  code, 
likewise  sprang  upon  Spitz.  But  Francois, 
chuckling  at  the  incident  while  unswerving  in 
the  administration  of  justice,  brought  his  lash 
down  upon  Buck  with  all  his  might.  This 
failed  to  drive  Buck  from  his  prostrate  rival, 
and  the  butt  of  the  whip  was  brought  into  play. 
Half-stunned  by  the  blow,  Buck  was  knocked 
backward  and  the  lash  laid  upon  him  again  and 
again,  while  Spitz  soundly  punished  the  many 
times  offending  Pike. 

In  the  days  that  followed,  as  Dawson  grew 
closer  and  closer,  Buck  still  continued  to  inter 
fere  between  Spitz  and  the  culprits;  but  he  did 
it  craftily,  when  Francois  was  not  around. 
With  the  covert  mutiny  of  Buck,  a  general  in 
subordination  sprang  up  and  increased.  Dave 
and  Sol-leks  were  unaffected,  but  the  rest  of  the 
team  went  from  bad  to  worse.  Things  no 
longer  went  right.  There  was  continual  bick 
ering  and  jangling.  Trouble  was  always  afoot, 


DOMINANT  PRIMORDIAL  BEAST      69 

and  at  the  bottom  of  it  was  Buck.  He  kept 
Francois  busy,  for  the  dog-driver  was  in  con 
stant  apprehension  of  the  life-and-death  strug 
gle  between  the  two  which  he  knew  must  take 
place  sooner  or  later;  and  on  more  than  one 
night  the  sounds  of  quarrelling  and  strife  among 
the  other  dogs  turned  him  out  of  his  sleeping 
robe,  fearful  that  Bucks  and  Spitz  were  at 
it. 

But  the  opportunity  did  not  present  itself, 
and  they  pulled  into  Dawson  one  dreary  after 
noon  with  the  great  fight  still  to  come.  Here 
were  many  men,  and  countless  dogs,  and  Buck 
found  them  all  at  work.  It  seemed  the  or 
dained  order  of  things  that  dogs  should  work. 
All  day  they  swung  up  and  down  the  main 
street  in  long  teams,  and  in  the  night  their 
jingling  bells  still  went  by.  They  hauled  cabin 
logs  and  firewood,  freighted  up  to  the  mines, 
and  did  all  manner  of  work  that  horses  did  in 
the  Santa  Clara  Valley.  Here  and  there  Buck 
met  Southland  dogs,  but  in  the  main  they  were 
the  wild  wolf  husky  breed.  Every  night,  regu 
larly,  at  nine,  at  twelve,  at  three,  they  lifted  a 


70  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

nocturnal  song,  a  weird  and  eerie  chant,  in 
which  it  was  Buck's  delight  to  join. 

With  the  aurora  borealis  flaming  coldly  over 
head,  or  the  stars  leaping  in  the  frost  dance, 
and  the  land  numb  and  frozen  under  its  pall  of 
snow,  this  song  of  the  huskies  might  have  been 
the  defiance  of  life,  only  it  was  pitched  in  minor 
key,  with  long-drawn  wailings  and  half-sobs, 
and  was  more  the  pleading  of  life,  the  articu 
late  travail  of  existence.  It  was  on  old  song, 
old  as  the  breed  itself  —  one  of  the  first  songs 
of  the  younger  world  in  a  day  when  songs 
were  sad.  It  was  invested  with  the  woe  of  un 
numbered  generations,  this  plaint  by  which  Buck 
was  so  strangely  stirred.  When  he  moaned 
and  sobbed,  it  was  with  the  pain  of  living  that 
was  of  old  the  pain  of  his  wild  fathers,  and  the 
fear  and  mystery  of  the  cold  and  dark  that  was 
to  them  fear  and  mystery.  And  that  he  should 
be  stirred  by  it  marked  the  completeness  with 
which  he  harked  back  through  the  ages  of  fire 
and  roof  to  the  raw  beginnings  of  life  in  the 
howling  ages. 

Seven  days  from  'the  time  they  pulled  into 


DOMINANT  PRIMORDIAL  BEAST      71 

Dawson,  they  dropped  down  the  steep  bank  by 
the  Barracks  to  the  Yukon  Trail,  and  pulled 
for  Dyea  and  Salt  Water.  Perrault  was  car 
rying  despatches  if  anything  more  urgent  than 
those  he  had  brought  in ;  also,  the  travel  pride 
had  gripped  him,  and  he  purposed  to  make  the 
record  trip  of  the  year.  Several  things  favored 
him  in  this.  The  week's  rest  had  recuperated 
the  dogs  and  put  them  in  thorough  trim.  The 
trail  they  had  broken  into  the  country  was 
packed  hard  by  later  journeyers.  And  fur 
ther,  the  police  had  arranged  in  two  or  three 
places  deposits  of  grub  for  dog  and  man,  and 
he  was  travelling  light. 

They  made  Sixty  Mile,  which  is  a  fifty-mile 
run,  on  the  first  day;  and  the  second  day  saw 
them  booming  up  the  Yukon  well  on  their  way 
to  Pelly.  But  such  splendid  running  was 
achieved  not  without  great  trouble  and  vexa 
tion  on  the  part  of  Francois.  The  insidious 
revolt  led  by  Buck  had  destroyed  the  solidarity 
of  the  team.  It  no  longer  was  as  one  dog 
leaping  in  the  traces.  The  encouragement 
Buck  gave  the  rebels  led  them  into  all  kinds  of 


72  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

petty  misdemeanors.  No  more  was  Spitz  a 
leader  greatly  to  be  feared.  The  old  awe  de 
parted,  and  they  grew  equal  to  challenging  his 
authority.  Pike  robbed  him  of  half  a  fish  one 
night,  and  gulped  it  down  under  the  protection 
of  Buck.  Another  night  Dub  and  Joe  fought 
Spitz  and  made  him  forego  the  punishment  they 
deserved.  And  even  Billee,  the  good-natured, 
was  less  good-natured,  and  whined  not  half  so 
placatingly  as  in  former  days.  Buck  never 
came  near  Spitz  without  snarling  and  bristling 
menacingly.  In  fact,  his  conduct  approached 
that  of  a  bully,  and  he  was  given  to  swaggering 
up  and  down  before  Spitz's  very  nose. 

The  breaking  down  of  discipline  likewise 
affected  the  dogs  in  their  relations  with  one 
another.  They  quarrelled  and  bickered  more 
than  ever  among  themselves,  till  at  times  the 
camp  was  a  howling  bedlam.  Dave  and  Sol- 
leks  alone  were  unaltered,  though  they  were 
made  irritable  by  the  unending  squabbling. 
Francois  swore  strange  barbarous  oaths,  and 
stamped  the  snow  in  futile  rage,  and  tore  his 
-  hair.  His  lash  was  always  singing  among  the 


DOMINANT  PRIMORDIAL  BEAST      73 

dogs,  but  it  was  of  small  avail.  Directly  his 
back  was  turned  they  were  at  it  again.  He 
backekd  up  Spitz  with  his  whip,  while  Buck 
backed  up  the  remainder  of  the  team.  Fran- 
c,ois  knew  he  was  behind  all  the  trouble,  and 
Buck  knew  he  knew;  but  Buck  was  too  clever 
ever  again  to  be  caught  red-handed.  He 
worked  faithfully  in  the  harness,  for  the  toil 
had  become  a  delight  to  him;  yet  it  was  a 
greater  delight  slyly  to  precipitate  a  fight 
amongst  his  mates  and  tangle  the  traces. 

At  the  mouth  of  the  Tahkeena,  one  night 
after  supper,  Dub  turned  up  a  snowshoe  rab 
bit,  blundered  it,  and  missed.  In  a  second  the 
whole  team  was  in  full  cry.  A  hundred  yards 
away  was  a  camp  of  the  Northwest  Police,  with 
fifty  dogs,  huskies  all,  who  joined  the  chase. 
The  rabbit  sped  down  the  river,  turned  off  into 
a  small  creek,  up  the  frozen  bed  of  which  it 
held  steadily.  It  ran  lightly  on  the  surface  of 
the  snow,  while  the  dogs  ploughed  through  by 
main  strength.  Buck  led  the  pack,  sixty  strong, 
around  bend  after  bend,  but  he  could  not  gain. 
He  lay  down  low  to  the  race,  whining  eagerly, 


74  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

his  splendid  body  flashing  forward,  leap  by  leap, 
in  the  wan  white  moonlight.  And  leap  by  leap, 
like  some  pale  frost  wraith,  the  snowshoe  rab 
bit  flashed  on  ahead. 

All  that  stirring  of  old  instincts  which  at 
stated  periods  drives  men  out  from  the  sound 
ing  cities  to  forest  and  plain  to  kill  things  by 
chemically  propelled  leaden  pellets,  the  blood 
lust,  the  joy  to  kill  —  all  this  was  Buck's,  only 
it  was  infinitely  more  intimate.  He  was  rang 
ing  at  the  head  of  the  pack,  running  the  wild 
thing  down,  the  living  meat,  to  kill  with  his  own 
teeth  and  wash  his  muzzle  to  the'  eyes  in  warm 
blood. 

There  is  an  ecstasy  that  marks  the  summit  of 
life,  and  beyond  which  life  cannot  rise.  And 
such  is  the  paradox  of  living,  this  ecstasy  comes 
when  one  is  most  alive,  and  it  comes  as  a  com 
plete  forgetfulness  that  one  is  alive.  This  ec 
stasy,  this  forgetfulness  of  living,  comes  to  the 
artist,  caught  up  and  out  of  himself  in  a  sheet 
of  flame;  it  comes  to  the  soldier,  war-mad  on  a 
stricken  field  and  refusing  quarter;  and  it  came 
to  Buck,  leading  the  pack,  sounding  the  old 


DOMINANT  PRIMORDIAL  BEAST      75 

wolf-cry,  straining  after  the  food  that  was  alive 
and  that  fled  swiftly  before  him  through  the 
rrtoonlight.  He  was  sounding  the  deeps  of  his 
nature,  and  of  the  parts  of  his  nature  that  were 
deeper  than  he,  going  back  into  the  womb  of 
Time.  He  was  mastered  by  the  sheer  surging 
of  life,  the  tidal  wave  of  being,  the  perfect  joy 
of  each  separate  muscle,  joint,  and  sinew  in  that 
it  was  everything  that  was  not  death,  that  it  was 
aglow  and  rampant,  expressing  itself  in  move 
ment,  flying  exultantly  under  the  stars  and  over 
the  face  of  dead  matter  that  did  not  move. 

But  Spitz,  cold  and  calculating  even  in  his 
supreme  moods,  left  the  pack  and  cut  across  a 
narrow  neck  of  land  where  the  creek  made  a 
long  bend  around.  Buck  did  not  know  of  this, 
and  as  he  rounded  the  bend,  the  frost  wraith 
of  a  rabbit  still  flitting  before  him,  he  saw  an 
other  and  larger  frost  wraith  leap  from  the 
overhanging  bank  into  the  immediate  path  of 
the  rabbit.  It  was  Spitz.  The  rabbit  could 
not  turn,  and  as  the  white  teeth  broke  its  back 
in  mid  air  it  shrieked  as  loudly  as  a  stricken 
man  may  shriek.  At  sound  of  this,  the  cry  of 


76  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

Life  plunging  down  from  Life's  apex  in  the  grip 
of  Death,  the  full  pack  at  Buck's  heels  raised 
a  hell's  chorus  of  delight. 

Buck  did  not  cry  out.  He  did  not  check  him 
self,  but  drove  in  upon  Spitz,  shoulder  to 
shoulder,  so  hard  that  he  missed  the  throat. 
They  rolled  over  and  over  in  the  powdery  snow. 
Spitz  gained  his  feet  almost  as  though  he  had 
not  been  overthrown,  slashing  Buck  down  the 
shoulder  and  leaping  clear.  Twice  his  teeth 
clipped  together,  like  the  steel  jaws  of  a  trap, 
as  he  backed  away  for  better  footing,  with  lean 
and  lifting  lips  that  writhed  and  snarled. 

In  a  flash  Buck  knew  it.  The  time  had 
come.  It  was  to  the  death.  As  they  circled 
about,  snarling,  ears  laid  back,  keenly  watchful 
for  the  advantage,  the  scene  came  back  to  Buck 
with  a  sense  of  familiarity.  He  seemed  to  re 
member  it  all, —  the  white  woods,  and  earth, 
and  moonlight,  and  the  thrill  of  battle.  Over 
the  whiteness  and  silence  brooded  a  ghostly 
calm.  There  was  "not  the  faintest  whisper  of 
air  —  nothing  moved,  not  a  leaf  quivered,  the 
visible  breaths  of  the,  dogs  rising  slowly  and 


DOMINANT  PRIMORDIAL  BEAST      77 

lingering  in  the  frosty  air.  They  had  made 
short  work  of  the  snowshoe  rabbit,  these  dogs 
that  were  ill-tamed  wolves;  and  they  were  now 
drawn  up  in  an  expectant  circle.  They,  too, 
were  silent,  their  eyes  only  gleaming  and  their 
breaths  drifting  slowly  upward.  To  Buck  it 
was  nothing  new  or  strange,  this  scene  of  old 
time.  It  was  as  though  it  had  always  been, 
the  wonted  way  of  things. 

Spitz  was  a  practised  fighter.  From  Spitz- 
bergen  through  the  Arctic,  and  across  Canada 
and  the  Barrens,  he  had  held  his  own  with  all 
manner  of  dogs  and  achieved  to  mastery  over 
them.  Bitter  rage  was  his,  but  never  blind 
rage.  In  passion  to  rend  and  destroy,  he  never 
forgot  that  his  enemy  was  in  like  passion  to 
rend  and  destroy.  He  never  rushed  till  he  was 
prepared  to  receive  a  rush ;  never  attacked  till 
he  had  first  defended  that  attack. 

In  vain  Buck  strove  to  sink  his  teeth  in  the 
neck  of  the  big  white  dog.  Wherever  his  fangs 
struck  for  the  softer  flesh,  they  were  countered 
by  the  fangs  of  Spitz.  Fang  clashed  fang,  and 
lips  were  cut  and  bleeding,  but  Buck  could  not 


78  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

penetrate  his  enemy's  guard.  Then  he  warmed 
up  and  enveloped  Spitz  in  a  whirlwind  of  rushes. 
Time  and  time  again  he  tried  for  the  snow- 
white  throat,  where  life  bubbled  near  to  the 
surface,  and  each  time  and  every  time  Spitz 
slashed  him  and  got  away.  Then  Buck  took  to 
rushing,  as  though  for  the  throat,  when,  sud 
denly  drawing  back  his  head  and  curving  in  from 
the  side,  he  would  drive  his  shoulder  at  the 
shoulder  of  Spitz,  as  a  ram  by  which  to  over 
throw  him.  But  instead,  Buck's  shoulder  was 
slashed  down  each  time  as  Spitz  leaped  lightly 
away. 

Spitz  was  untouched,  while  Buck  was 
streaming  with  blood  and  panting  hard.  The 
fight  was  growing  desperate.  And  all  the  while 
the  silent  and  wolfish  circle  waited  to  finish  off 
whichever  dog  went  down.  As  Buck  grew 
winded,  Spitz  took  to  rushing,  and  he  kept  him 
staggering  for  footing.  Once  Buck  went  over, 
and  the  whole  circle  of  sixty  dogs  started  up; 
but  he  recovered  himself,  almost  in  mid  air,  and 
the  circle  sank  down  again  and  waited. 

But  Buck  possessed  a  quality  that  made  for 


DOMINANT  PRIMORDIAL  BEAST      79 

greatness  —  imagination.  He  fought  by  in 
stinct,  but  he  could  fight  by  head  as  well.  He 
rushed,  as  though  attempting  the  old  shoulder 
trick,  but  at  the  last  instant  swept  low  to  the 
snow  and  in.  His  teeth  closed  on  Spitz's  left 
fore  leg.  There  was  a  crunch  of  breaking 
bone,  and  the  white  dog  faced  him  on  three 
legs.  Thrice  he  tried  to  knock  him  over,  then 
repeated  the  trick  and  broke  the  right  fore  leg. 
Despite  the  pain  and  helplessness,  Spitz  strug 
gled  madly  to  keep  up.  He  saw  the  silent 
circle,  with  gleaming  eyes,  lolling  tongues,  and 
silvery  breaths  drifting  upward,  closing  in  upon 
him  as  he  had  seen  similar  circles  close  in  upon 
beaten  antagonists  in  the  past.  Only  this  time 
he  was  the  one  who  was  beaten. 

There  was  no  hope  for  him.  Buck  was  in 
exorable.  Mercy  was  a  thing  reserved  for 
gentler  climes.  He  manoeuvred  for  the  final 
rush.  This  circle  had  tightened  till  he  could 
feel  the  breaths  of  the  huskies  on  his  flanks. 
He  could  see  them,  beyond  Spitz  and  to  either 
side,  half  crouching  for  the  spring,  their  eyes 
fixed  upon  him.  A  pause  seemed  to  fall. 


80  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

Every  animal  was  motionless  as  though  turned 
to  stone.  Only  Spitz  quivered  and  bristled  as 
he  staggered  back  and  forth,  snarling  with  hor 
rible  menace,  as  though  to  frighten  off  impend 
ing  death.  Then  Buck  sprang  in  and  out;  but 
while  he  was  in,  shoulder  had  at  last  squarely 
met  shoulder.  The  dark  circle  became  a  dot 
on  the  moon-flooded  snow  as  Spitz  disappeared 
from  view.  Buck  stood  and  looked  on,  the 
successful  champion,  the  dominant  primordial 
beast  who  had  made  his  kill  and  found  it  good. 


IV 
WHO  HAS  WON  TO  MASTERSHIP 


IV 
Who  Has  Won  to  Mastership 

""• "VH?     Wot  I  say?     I  spik  true  w'en  I 
i      say  dat  Buck  two  devils." 

This  was  Francois's  speech  next 
morning  when  he  discovered  Spitz  missing  and 
Buck  covered  with  wounds.  He  drew  him  to 
the  fire  and  by  its  light  pointed  them  out. 

"  Dat  Spitz  fight  lak  hell,"  said  Perrauit,  as 
he  surveyed  the  gaping  rips  and  cuts. 

"An'  dat  Buck  fight  lak  two  hells,"  was 
Francois's  answer.  "  An'  now  we  make  good 
time.  No  more  Spitz,  no  more  trouble,  sure." 

While  Perrauit  packed  the  camp  outfit  and 
loaded  the  sled,  the  dog-driver  proceeded  to 
harness  the  dogs.  Buck  trotted  up  to  the  place 
Spitz  would  have  occupied  as  leader;  but  Fran 
ks,  not  noticing  him,  brought  Sol-leks  to  the 
83 


84  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

coveted  position.  In  his  judgment,  Sol-leks  was 
the  best  lead-dog  left.  Buck  sprang  upon  Sol- 
leks  in  a  fury,  driving  him  back  and  standing 
in  his  place. 

"Eh?  eh?"  Francois  cried,  slapping  his 
thighs  gleefully.  "  Look  at  dat  Buck.  Heem 
keel  dat  Spitz,  heem  fink  to  take  de  job." 

"  Go  'way,  Chook!  "  he  cried,  but  Buck  re 
fused  to  budge. 

He  took  Buck  by  the  scruff  of  the  neck,  and 
though  the  dog  growled  threateningly,  dragged 
him  to  one  side  and  replaced  Sol-leks.  The 
old  dog  did  not  like  it,  and  showed  plainly  that 
he  was  afraid  of  Buck.  Francois  was  obdurate, 
but  when  he  turned  his  back  Buck  again  dis 
placed  Sol-leks,  who  was  not  at  all  unwilling  to 
go. 

.  Francois  was  angry.  "  Now,  by  Gar,  I  feex 
you!  "  he  cried,  coming  back  with  a  heavy  club 
in  his  hand. 

Buck  remembered  the  man  in  the  red 
sweater,  and  retreated  slowly:  nor  did  he  at 
tempt  to  charge  in  when  Sol-leks  was  once  more 
brought  forward.  But  he  circled  just  beyond 


WHO  HAS  WON  TO  MASTERSHIP     85 

the  range  of  the  club,  snarling  with  bitterness 
and  rage;  and  while  he  circled  he  watched  the 
club  so  as  to  dodge  it  if  thrown  by  Franqois,  for 
he  was  become  wise  in  the  way  of  clubs. 

The  driver  went  about  his  work,  and  he 
called  to  Buck  when  he  was  ready  to  put  him  in 
his  old  place  in  front  of  Dave.  Buck  retreated 
two  or  three  steps.  Francois  followed  him  up, 
whereupon  he  again  retreated.  After  some 
time  of  this,  Francois  threw  down  the  club, 
thinking  that  Buck  feared  a  thrashing.  But 
Buck  was  in  open  revolt.  He  wanted,  not  to 
escape  a  clubbing,  but  to  have  the  leadership. 
It  was  his  by  right.  He  had  earned  it,  and  he 
would  not  be  content  with  less. 

Perrault  took  a  hand.  Between  them  they 
ran  him  about  for  the  better  part  of  an  hour 
They  threw  clubs  at  him.  He  dodged.  They 
cursed  him,  and  his  fathers  and  mothers  before 
him,  and  all  his  seed  to  come  after  him  down 
to  the  remotest  generation,  and  every  hair  on 
his  body  and  drop  of  blood  in  his  veins;  and 
he  answered  curse  with  snarl  and  kept  out  of 
their  reach.  He  did  not  try  to  run  away,  but 


86  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

retreated  around  and  around  the  camp,  adver 
tising  plainly  that  when  his  desire  was  met,  he 
would  come  in  and  be  good. 

Frangois  sat  down  and  scratched  his  head. 
Perrault  looked  at  his  watch  and  swore.  Time 
was  flying,  and  they  should  have  been  on  the 
trail  an  hour  gone.  Francois  scratched  his 
head  again.  He  shook  it  and  grinned  sheep 
ishly  at  the  courier,  who  shrugged  his  shoul 
ders  in  sign  that  they  were  beaten.  Then 
Francois  went  up  to  where  Sol-leks  stood  and 
called  to  Buck.  Buck  laughed,  as  dogs  laugh, 
yet  kept  his  distance.  Francois  unfastened 
Sol-lek's  traces  and  put  him  back  in  his  old 
place.  The  team  stood  harnessed  to  the  sled 
in  an  unbroken  line,  ready  for  the  trail. 
There  was  no  place  for  Buck  save  at  the  front. 
Once  more  Francois  called,  and  once  more 
Buck  laughed  and  kept  away. 

"  T'row  down  de  club,"  Perrault  commanded. 

Francois  complied,  whereupon  Buck  trotted 
in,  laughing  triumphantly,  and  swung  around 
into  position  at  the  head  of  the  team.  His 
traces  were  fastened,  the  sled  broken  out,  and 


WHO  HAS  WON  TO  MASTERSHIP      87 

with  both  men  running  they  dashed  out  on  to 
the  river  trail. 

Highly  as  the  dog-driver  had  forevalued 
Buck,  with  his  two  devils,  he  found,  while  the 
day  was  yet  young,  that  he  had  undervalued. 
At  a  bound  Buck  took  up  the  duties  of  leader 
ship;  and  where  judgment  was  required,  and 
quick  thinking  and  quick  acting,  he  showed 
himself  the  superior  even  of  Spitz,  of  whom 
Francois  had  never  seen  an  equal. 

But  it  was  in  giving  the  law  and  making  his 
mates  live  up  to  it,  that  Buck  excelled.  Dave 
and  Sol-leks  did  not  mind  the  change  in  leader 
ship.  It  was  none  of  their  business.  Their 
business  was  to  toil,  and  toil  mightily,  in  the 
traces.  So  long  as  that  were  not  interfered 
with,  they  did  not  care  what  happened.  Billee, 
the  good-natured,  could  lead  for  all  they  cared, 
so  long  as  he  kept  order.  The  rest  of  the  team, 
however,  had  grown  unruly  during  the  last 
days  of  Spitz,  and  their  surprise  was  great  now 
that  Buck  proceeded  to  lick  them  into  shape. 

Pike,  who  pulled  at  Buck's  heels,  and  who 
never  put  an  ounce  more  of  his  weight  against 


88  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

the  breast-band  than  he  was  compelled  to  do, 
was  swiftly  and  repeatedly  shaken  for  loafing; 
and  ere  the  first  day  was  done  he  was  pulling 
more  than  ever  before  in  his  life.  The  first 
night  in  camp,  Joe,  the  sour  one,  was  punished 
roundly  —  a  thing  that  Spitz  had  never  suc 
ceeded  in  doing.  Buck  simply  smothered  him 
by  virtue  of  superior  weight,  and  cut  him  up 
till  he  ceased  snapping  and  began  to  whine  for 
mercy. 

The  general  tone  of  the  team  picked  up 
immediately.  It  recovered  its  old-time  soli 
darity,  and  once  more  the  dogs  leaped  as  one 
dog  in  the  traces.  At  the  Rink  Rapids  two 
native  huskies,  Teek  and  Koona,  were  added; 
and  the  celerity  with  which  Buck  broke  them 
in  took  away  Francois's  breath. 

"  Nevaire  such  a  dog  as  dat  Buck!"  he 
cried.  ci  No,  nevaire !  Heem  worth  one 
t'ousan'  dollair,  by  Gar!  Eh?  Wot  you 
say,  Perrault?  " 

And  Perrault  nodded.  He  was  ahead  of 
the  record  then,  and  gaining  day  by  day. 
The  trail  was  in  excellent  condition,  well 


WHO  HAS  WON  TO  MASTERSHIP      89 

packed  and  hard,  and  there  was  no  new-fallen 
snow  with  which  to  contend.  It  was  not  too 
cold.  The  temperature  dropped  to  fifty  below 
zero  and  remained  there  on  the  whole  trip. 
The  men  rode  and  ran  by  turn,  and  the  dogs 
were  kept  on  the  jump,  with  but  infrequent 
stoppages. 

The  Thirty  Mile  River  was  comparatively 
coated  with  ice,  and  they  covered  in  one  day 
going  out  what  had  taken  them  ten  days 
coming  in.  In  one  run  they  made  a  sixty- 
mile  dash  from  the  foot  of  Lake  Le  Barge 
to  the  White  Horse  Rapids.  Across  Marsh, 
Tagish,  and  Bennett  (seventy  miles  of  lakes), 
they  flew  so  fast  that  the  man  whose  turn  it 
was  to  run  towed  behind  the  sled  at  the  end  of 
a  rope.  And  on  the  last  night  of  the  second 
week  they  topped  White  Pass  and  dropped 
down  the  sea  slope  with  the  lights  of  Skaguay 
and  of  the  shipping  at  their  feet. 

It  was  a  record  run.  Each  day  for  fourteen 
days  they  had  averaged  forty  miles.  For  three 
days  Perrault  and  Franqots  threw  chests  up 
and  down  the  main  street  of  Skaguay  and  were 


90  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

deluged  with  invitations  to  drink,  while  the 
team  was  the  constant  centre  of  a  worshipful 
crowd  of  dog-busters  and  mushers.  Then 
three  or  four  western  bad  men  aspired  to 
clean  out  the  town,  were  riddled  like  pepper 
boxes  for  their  pains,  and  public  interest 
turned  to  other  idols.  Next  came  official 
orders.  Francois  called  Buck  to  him,  threw 
his  arms  around  him,  wept  over  him.  And 
that  was  the  last  of  Franqois  and  Perrault. 
Like  other  men,  they  passed  out  of  Buck's 
life  for  good. 

A  Scotch  half-breed  took  charge  of  him  and 
his  mates,  and  in  company  with  a  dozen  other 
dog-teams  he  started  back  over  the  weary  trail 
to  Dawson.  It  was  no  light  running  now,  nor 
record  time,  but  heavy  toil  each  day,  with  a 
heavy  load  behind ;  for  this  was  the  mail  train, 
carrying  word  from  the  world  to  the  men  who 
sought  gold  under  the  shadow  of  the  Pole. 

Buck  did  not  like  it,  but  he  bore  up  well  to 
the  work,  taking  pride  in  it  after  the  manner 
of  Dave  and  Sol-leks,  and  seeing  that  his 
mates,  whether  they  prided  in  it  or  not,  did 


WHO  HAS  WON  TO  MASTERSHIP     91 

their  fair  share.  It  was  a  monotonous  life, 
operating  with  machine-like  regularity.  One 
day  was  very  like  another.  At  a  certain  time 
each  morning  the  cooks  turned  out,  fires  were 
built,  and  breakfast  was  eaten.  Then,  while 
some  broke  camp,  others  harnessed  the  dogs, 
and  they  were  under  way  an  hour  or  so  before 
the  darkness  fell  which  gave  warning  of  dawn. 
At  night,  camp  was  'made.  Some  pitched  the 
flies,  others  cut  firewood  and  pine  boughs  for 
the  beds,  and  still  others  carried  water  or  ice 
for  the  cooks.  Also,  the  dogs  were  fed.  To 
them,  this  was  the  one  feature  of  the  day, 
though  it  was  good  to  loaf  around,  after  the 
fish  was  eaten,  for  an  hour  or  so  with  the  other 
dogs,  of  which  there  were  fivescore  and  odd. 
There  were  fierce  fighters  among  them,  but 
three  battles  with  the  fiercest  brought  Buck 
to  mastery,  so  that  when  he  bristled  and 
showed  his  teeth  they  got  out  of  his  way. 

Best  of  all,  perhaps,  he  loved  to  lie  near  the 
fire,  hind  legs  crouched  under  him,  fore  legs 
stretched  out  in  front,  head  raised,  and  eyes 
blinking  dreamily  at  the  flames.  Sometimes 


92  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

he  thought  of  Judge  Miller's  big  house  in  the 
sun-kissed  Santa  Clara  Valley,  and  of  the 
cement  swimming-tank,  and  Ysabel,  the  Mexi 
can  hairless,  and  Toots,  the  Japanese  pug; 
but  oftener  he  remembered  the  man  in  the 
red  sweater,  the  death  of  Curly,  the  great  fight 
with  Spitz,  and  the  good  things  he  had  eaten 
or  would  like  to  eat.  He  was  not  homesick. 
The  Sunland  was  very  dim  and  distant,  and  such 
memories  had  no  power  over  him.  Far  more 
potent  were  the  memories  of  his  heredity  that 
gave  things  he  had  never  seen  before  a  seeming 
familiarity;  the  instincts  (which  were  but  the 
memories  of  his  ancestors  become  habits) 
which  had  lapsed  in  later  days,  and  still  later, 
in  him,  quickened  and  became  alive  again. 

Sometimes  as  he  crouched  there,  blinking 
dreamily  at  the  flames,  it  seemed  that  the 
flames  were  of  another  fire,  and  that  as  he 
crouched  by  this  other  fire  he  saw  another  and 
different  man  from  the  half-breed  cook  before 
him.  This  other  man  was  shorter  of  leg  and 
longer  of  arm,  with  muscles  that  were  stringy 
and  knotty  rather  than  rounded  and  swelling. 


WHO  HAS  WON  TO  MASTERSHIP      93 

The  hair  of  this  man  was  long  and  matted, 
and  his  head  slanted  back  under  it  from  the 
eyes.  He  uttered  strange  sounds,  and  seemed 
very  much  afraid  of  the  darkness,  into  which 
he  peered  continually,  clutching  in  his  hand, 
which  hung  midway  between  knee  and  foot,  a 
stick  with  a  heavy  stone  made  fast  to  the  end. 
He  was  all  but  naked,  a  ragged  and  fire- 
scorched  skin  hanging  part  way  down  his  back, 
but  on  his  body  there  was  much  hair.  In  some 
places,  across  the  chest  and  shoulders  and 
down  the  outside  of  the  arms  and  thighs,  it 
was  matted  into  almost  a  thick  fur.  He  did 
not  stand  erect,  but  with  trunk  inclined  for 
ward  from  the  hips,  on  legs  that  bent  at  the 
knees.  About  his  body  there  was  a  peculiar 
springiness,  or  resiliency,  almost  catlike,  and  a 
quick  alertness  as  of  one  who  lived  in  perpetual 
fear  of  things  seen  and  unseen. 

At  other  times  this  hairy  man  squatted  by 
the  fire  with  head  between  his  legs  and  slept. 
On  such  occasions  his  elbows  were  on  his 
knees,  his  hands  clasped  above  his  head  as 
though  to  shed  rain  by  the  hairy  arms.  And 


94  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

beyond  that  fire,  in  the  circling  darkness,  Buck 
could  see  many  gleaming  coals,  two  by  two, 
always  two  by  two,  which  he  knew  to  be  the 
eye's  of  great  beasts  of  prey.  And  he  could 
hear  the  crashing  of  their  bodies  through  the 
undergrowth,  and  the  noises  they  made  in  the 
night.  And  dreaming  there  by  the  Yukon 
bank,  with  laxy  eyes  blinking  at  the  fire,  these 
sounds  and  sights  of  another  world  would 
make  the  hair  to  rise  along  his  back  and  stand 
on  end  across  his  shoulders  and  up  his  neck,  till 
he  whimpered  low  and  suppressedly,  or  growled 
softly,  and  the  half-breed  cook  shouted  at  him, 
"  Hey,  you  Buck,  wake  up !"  Whereupon  the 
other  world  would  vanish  and  the  real  world 
come  into  his  eyes,  and  he  would  get  up  and 
yawn  and  stretch  as  though  he  had  been  asleep. 
It  was  a  hard  trip,  with  the  mail  behind 
them,  and  the  heavy  work  wore  them  down. 
They  were  short  of  weight  and  in  poor  condi 
tion  when  they  made  Dawson,  and  should  have 
had  had  a  ten  days'  or  a  week's  rest  at  least. 
But  in  two  days'  time  they  dropped  down  the 
Yukon  bank  from  the  Barracks,  loaded  with 


WHO  HAS  WON  TO  MASTERSHIP     95 

letters  for  the  outside.  The  dogs  were  tired, 
the  drivers  grumbling,  and  to  make  matters 
worse,  it  snowed  every  day.  This  meant  a 
soft  trail,  greater  friction  on  the  runners,  and 
heavier  pulling  for  the  dogs,  yet  the  drivers 
were  fair  through  it  all,  and  did  their  best  for 
the  animals. 

Each  night  the  dogs  were  attended  to  first. 
They  ate  before  the  drivers  ate,  and  no  man 
sought  his  sleeping-robe  till  he  had  seen  to  the 
feet  of  the  dogs  he  drove.  Still,  their  strength 
went  down.  Since  the  beginning  of  the  winter 
they  had  travelled  eighteen  hundred  miles, 
dragging  sleds  the  whole  weary  distance;  and 
eighteen  hundred  miles  will  tell  upon  life  of 
the  toughest.  Buck  stood  it,  keeping  his 
mates  up  to  their  work  and  maintaining  dis 
cipline,  though  he  too  was  very  tired.  Billee 
cried  and  whimpered  regularly  in  his  sleep  each 
night.  Joe  was  sourer  than  ever,  and  Sol-leks 
was  unapproachable,  blind  side  or  other  side. 

But  it  was  Dave  who  suffered  most  of  all. 
Something  had  gone  wrong  with  him.  He 
became  more  morose  and  irritable,  and  when 


96  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

camp  was  pitched  at  once  made  his  nest,  where 
his  driver  fed  him.  Once  out  of  the  harness 
and  down,  he  did  not  get  on  his  feet  again  till 
harness-up  time  in  the  morning.  Sometimes, 
in  the  traces,  when  jerked  by  a  sudden  stop 
page  of  the  sled,  or  by  straining  to  start  it,  he 
would  cry  out  with  pain.  The  driver  examined 
him,  but  could  find  nothing.  All  the  drivers 
became  interested  in  his  case.  They  talked  it 
over  at  meal-time,  and  over  their  last  pipes 
before  going  to  bed,  and  one  night  they  held  a 
consultation.  He  was  brought  from  his  nest 
to  the  fire  and  was  pressed  and  prodded  till  he 
cried  out  many  times.  Something  was  wrong 
inside,  but  they  could  locate  no  broken  bones, 
could  not  make  it  out. 

By  the  time  Cassiar  Bar  was  reached,  he 
was  so  weak  that  he  was  falling  repeatedly  in 
the  traces.  The  Scotch  half-breed  called  a  halt 
and  took  him  out  of  the  team,  making  the  next 
dog,  Sol-leks,  fast  to  the  sled.  His  intention 
was  to  rest  Dave,  letting  him  run  free  behind 
the  sled.  Sick  as  he  was,  Dave  resented  being 
taken  out,  grunting  and  growling  while  the 


WHO  HAS  WON  TO  MASTERSHIP     97 

traces  were  unfastened,  and  whimpering  broken- 
heartedly  when  he  saw  Sol-leks  in  the  position 
he  had  held  and  served  so  long.  For  the  pride 
of  trace  and  trail  was  his,  and,  sick  unto  death, 
he  could  not  bear  that  another  dog  should  do 
his  work. 

When  the  sled  started,  he  floundered  in  the 
soft  snow  alongside  the  beaten  trail,  attacking 
Sol-leks  with  his  teeth,  rushing  against  him  and 
trying  to  thrust  him  off  into  the  soft  snow  on 
the  other  side,  striving  to  leap  inside  his  trace* 
and  get  between  him  and  the  sled,  and  all  the 
while  whining  and  yelping  and  crying  with  grief 
and  pain.  The  half-breed  tried  to  drive  him 
away  with  the  whip,  but  he  paid  no  heed  to  the 
stinging  lash,  and  the  man  had  not  the  heart 
to  strike  harder.  Dave  refused  to  run  quietly 
on  the  trail  behind  the  sled,  where  the  going 
was  easy,  but  continued  to  flounder  alongside  in 
the  soft  snow,  where  the  going  was  most  diffi 
cult,  till  exhausted.  Then  he  fell,  and  lay 
where  he  fell,  howling  lugubriously  as  the  long 
train  of  sleds  churned  by. 

With  the  last  remnant  of  his   strength  he 


98  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

managed  to  stagger  along  behind  till  the  train 
made  another  stop,  when  he  floundered  past 
the  sleds  to  his  own,  where  he  stood  alongside 
Sol-leks.  His  driver  lingered  a  moment  to  get 
a  light  for  his  pipe  from  the  man  behind. 
Then  he  returned  and  started  his  dogs.  They 
swung  out  on  the  trail  with  remarkable  lack 
of  exertion,  turned  their  heads  uneasily,  and 
stopped  in  surprise.  The  driver  was  surprised, 
too;  the  sled  had  not  moved.  He  called  his 
comrades  to  witness  the  sight.  Dave  had  bit 
ten  through  both  of  Sol-leks's  traces,  and  was 
standing  directly  in  front  of  the  sled  in  his 
proper  place. 

He  pleaded  with  his  eyes  to  remain  there. 
The  driver  was  perplexed.  His  comrades 
talked  of  how  a  dog  could  break  its  heart 
through  being  denied  the  work  that  killed  it, 
and  recalled  instances  they  had  known,  where 
dogs,  too  old  for  the  toil,  or  injured,  had  died 
because  they  were  cut  out  of  the  traces.  Also, 
they  held  it  a  mercy,  since  Dave  was  to  die 
anyway,  that  he  should  die  in  the  traces,  heart- 
easy  and  content.  So  he  was  harnessed  in 


WHO  HAS  WON  TO  MASTERSHIP     99 

again,  and  proudly  he  pulled  as  of  old,  though 
more  than  once  he  cried  out  involuntarily  from 
the  bite  of  his  inward  hurt.  Several  times  he 
fell  down  and  was  dragged  in  the  traces,  and 
once  the  sled  ran  upon  him  so  that  he  limped 
thereafter  in  one  of  his  hind  legs. 

But  he  held  out  till  camp  was  reached,  when 
his  driver  made  a  place  for  him  by  the  fire. 
Morning  found  him  too  weak  to  travel.  At 
harness-up  time  he  tried  to  crawl  to  his  driver. 
By  convulsive  efforts  he  got  on  his  feet,  stag 
gered,  and  fell.  Then  he  wormed  his  way 
forward  slowly  toward  where  the  harnesses 
were  being  put  on  his  mates.  He  would  ad 
vance  his  fore  legs  and  drag  up  his  body  with 
a  sort  of  hitching  movement,  when  he  would 
advance  his  fore  legs  and  hitch  ahead  again  for 
a  few  more  inches.  His  strength  left  him,  and 
the  last  his  mates  saw  of  him  he  lay  gasping 
in  th^  snow  and  yearning  toward  them.  But 
they  could  hear  him  mournfully  howling  till 
they  passed  out  of  sight  behind  a  belt  of  river 
timber. 

Here  the  train  was  halted.     The  Scotch  half- 


100          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

breed  slowly  retraced  his  steps  to  the  camp 
they  had  left.  The  men  ceased  talking.  A 
revolver-shot  rang  out.  The  man  came  back 
hurriedly.  The  whips  snapped,  the  bells  tin 
kled  merrily,  the  sleds  churned  along  the  trail ; 
but  Buck  knew,  and  every  dog  knew,  what  had 
taken  place  behind  the  belt  of  river  trees. 


V 

THE  TOIL  OF  TRACE  AND  TRAIL 


The  Toil  of  Trace  and  Trail 

THIRTY  days  from  the  time  it  left 
Dawson,  the  Salt  Water  Mail,  with 
Buck  and  his  mates  at  the  fore,  ar 
rived  at  Skaguay.  They  were  in  a  wretched 
state,  worn  out  and  worn  down.  Buck's  one 
hundred  and  forty  pounds  had  dwindled  to 
one  hundred  and  fifteen.  The  rest  of  his 
mates,  though  lighter  dogs,  had  relatively  lost 
more  weight  than  he.  Pike,  the  malingerer, 
who,  in  his  lifetime  of  deceit,  had  often  suc 
cessfully  feigned  a  hurt  leg,  was  now  limping 
in  earnest.  Sol-leks  was  limping,  and  Duh  was 
suffering  from  a  wrenched  shoulder-blade. 

They  were  all  terribly  footsore.  No  spring 
or  rebound  was  left  in  them.  Their  feet  fell 
heavily  on  the  trail,  jarring  their  bodies  and 
doubling  the  fatigue  of  a  day's  travel.  There 
was  nothing  the  matter  with  them  except  that 

103 


104          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

they  were  dead  tired.  It  was  not  the  dead- 
tiredness  that  comes  through  brief  and  exces 
sive  effort,  from  which  recovery  is  a  matter  of 
hours;  but  it  was  the  dead-tiredness  that  comes 
through  the  slow  and  prolonged  strength  drain 
age  of  months  of  toil.  There  was  no  power  of 
recuperation  left,  no  reserve  strength  to  call 
upon.  It  had  been  all  used,  the  last  least  bit  of 
it.  Every  muscle,  every  fibre,  every  cell,  was 
tired,  dead  tired.  And  there  was  reason  for  it. 
In  less  than  five  months  they  had  travelled 
twenty-five  hundred  miles,  during  the  last 
eighteen  hundred  of  which  they  had  had  but  five 
days'  rest.  When  they  arrived  at  Skaguay  they 
were  apparently  on  their  last  legs.  They  could 
barely  keep  the  traces  taut,  and  on  the  down 
grades  just  managed  to  keep  out  of  the  way 
of  the  sled. 

"  Mush  on,  poor  sore  feets,"  the  driver  en 
couraged  them  as  they  tottered  down  the  main 
street  of  Skaguay.  "  Dis  is  de  las'.  Den  we 
get  one  long  res'.  Eh?  For  sure.  One  bully 
long  res'." 

The  drivers  confidently  expected  a  long  stop- 


THE  TOIL  OF  TRACE  AND  TRAIL     105 

over.  Themselves,  they  had  covered  twelve 
hundred  miles  with  two  days'  rest,  and  in  the 
nature  of  reason  and  common  justice  they  de 
served  an  interval  of  loafing.  But  so  many 
were  the  men  who  had  rushed  into  the  Klon 
dike,  and  so  many  were  the  sweethearts,  wives, 
and  kin  that  had  not  rushed  in,  that  the  con 
gested  mail  was  taking  on  Alpine  proportions; 
also,  there  were  official  orders.  Fresh  batches 
of  Hudson  Bay  dogs  were  to  take  the  places  of 
those  worthless  for  the  trail.  The  worthless 
ones  were  to  be  got  rid  of,  and,  since  dogs  count 
for  little  against  dollars,  they  were  to  be  sold. 
Three  days  passed,  by  which  time  Buck  and 
his  mates  found  how  really  tired  and  weak  they 
were.  Then,  on  the  morning  of  the  fourth 
day,  two  men  from  the  States  came  along  and 
bought  them,  harness  and  all,  for  a  song.  The 
men  addressed  each  other  as  "  Hal "  and 
"  Charles."  Charles  was  a  middle-aged,  light 
ish-colored  man,  with  weak  and  watery  eyes 
and  a  mustache  that  twisted  fiercely  and  vigor 
ously  up,  giving  the  lie  to  the  limply  drooping 
lip  it  concealed.  Hal  was  a  youngster  of  nine- 


io6          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

teen  or  twenty,  with  a  big  Colt's  revolver  and 
a  hunting-knife  strapped  about  him  on  a  belt 
that  fairly  bristled  with  cartridges.  This  belt 
was  the  most  salient  thing  about  him.  It  ad 
vertised  his  callowness  —  a  callowness  sheer 
and  unutterable.  Both  men  were  manifestly 
out  of  place,  and  why  such  as  they  should  ad 
venture  the  North  is  part  of  the  mystery  of 
things  that  passes  understanding. 

Buck  heard  the  chaffering,  saw  the  money 
pass  between  the  man  and  the  Government 
agent,  and  knew  that  the  Scotch  half-breed  and 
the  mail-train  drivers  were  passing  out  of  his 
life  on  the  heels  of  Perrault  and  Francois  and 
the  others  who  had  gone  before.  When  driven 
with  his  mates  to  the  new  owners'  camp.  Buck 
saw  a  slipshod  and  slovenly  affair,  tent  half 
stretched,  dishes  unwashed,  everything  in  dis 
order;  also,  he  saw  a  woman.  u  Mercedes  " 
the  men  called  her.  She  was  Charles's  wife 
and  Hal's  sister  —  a  nice  family  party. 

Buck  watched  them  apprehensively  as  they 
proceeded  to  take  down  the  tent  and  load  the 
sled.  There  was  a  great  deal  of  effort  about 


THE  TOIL  OF  TRACE  AND  TRAIL      107 

their  manner,  but  no  businesslike  method.  The 
tent  was  rolled  into  an  awkward  bundle  three 
times  as  large  as  it  should  have  been.  The  tin 
dishes  were  packed  away  unwashed.  Mercedes 
continually  fluttered  in  the  way  of  her  men  and  * 
kept  up  an  unbroken  chattering  of  remonstrance 
and  advice.  When  they  put  a  clothes-sack  on 
the  front  of  the  sled,  she  suggested  it  should 
go  on  the  back;  and  when  they  had  it  put  on  the 
back,  and  covered  it  over  with  a  couple  of  other 
bundles,  she  discovered  overlooked  articles 
which  could  abide  nowhere  else  but  in  that  very 
sack,  and  they  unloaded  again. 

Three  men  from  a  neighboring  tent  came 
out  and  looked  on,  grinning  and  winking  at  one 
another. 

"  YouVe  got  a  right  smart  'load  as  it  is," 
said  one  of  them;  "  and  it's  not  me  should  tell 
you  your  business,  but  I  wouldn't  tote  that  tent 
along  if  I  was  you." 

"  Undreamed  of!"  cried  Mercedes,  throw 
ing  up  her  hands  in  dainty  dismay.  "  How 
ever  in  the  world  could  I  manage  without  a 
tent?" 


io8    THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

"  It's  springtime,  and  you  won't  get  any  more 
cold  weather,"  the  man  replied. 

She  shook  her  head  decidedly,  and  Charles 
and  Hal  put  the  last  odds  and  ends  on  top  the 
mountainous  load. 

"  Think  it'll  ride?  "  one  of  the  men  asked. 

"Why  shouldn't  it?"  Charles  demanded 
rather  shortly. 

"  Oh,  that's  all  right,  that's  all  right,"  the 
man  hastened  meekly  to  say.  "  I  was  just 
a-wonderin',  that  is  all.  It  seemed  a  mite  top- 
heavy." 

Charles  turned  his  back  and  drew  the  lash 
ings  down  as  well  as  he  could,  which  was  not 
in  the  least  well. 

"  An'  of  course  the  dogs  can  hike  along  all 
day  with  that  contraption  behind  them,"  af 
firmed  a  second  of  the  men. 

"  Certainly,"  said  Hal,  with  freezing  polite 
ness,  taking  hold  of  the  gee-pole  with  one 
hand  and  swinging  his  whip  from  the  other. 
"  Mush !  "  he  shouted.  "  Mush  on  there !  " 

The  dogs  sprang  against  the   breastbands. 


THE  TOIL  OF  TRACE  AND  TRAIL     109 

strained  hard  for  a  few  moments,  then  relaxed. 
They  were  unable  to  move  the  sled. 

"  The  lazy  brutes,  I'll  show  them,"  he  cried, 
preparing  to  lash  out  at  them  with  the  whip. 

But,  Mercedes  interfered,  crying,  "  Oh,  Hal, 
you  mustn't,"  as  she  caught  hold  of  the  whip 
and  wrenched  it  from  him.  "  The  poor  dears ! 
Now  you  must  promise* you  won't  be  harsh  with 
them  for  the  rest  of  the  trip,  or  I  won't  go  a 
step." 

"  Precious  lot  you  know  about  dogs,"  her 
brother  sneered;  "and  I  wish  you'd  leave  me 
-alone.  They're  lazy,  I  tell  you,  and  you've  got 
to  whip  them  to  get  anything  out  of  them. 
That's  their  way.  You  ask  any  one.  Ask 
one  of  those  men." 

Mercedes  looked  at  them  imploringly,  untold 
repugnance  at  sight  of  pain  written  in  her  pretty 
face. 

4  They're  weak  as  water,  if  you  want  to 
know,"  came  the  reply  from  one  of  the  men. 
"  Plum  tuckered  out,  that's  what's  the  matter. 
They  need  a  rest." 


no          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

"  Rest  be  blanked,"  said  Hal,  with  his  beard 
less  lips;  and  Mercedes  said,  "Oh!"  in  pain 
and  sorrow  at  the  oath. 

But  she  was  a  clannish  creature,  and  rushed 
at  once  to  the  defence  of  her  brother.  "  Never 
mind  that  man,"  she  said  pointedly.  "  You're 
driving  our  dogs,  and  you  do  what  you  think 
best  with  them." 

Again  Hal's  whip  fell  upon  the  dogs.  They 
threw  themselves  against  the  breast-bands,  dug 
their  feet  into  the  packed  snow,  got  down  low 
to  it,  and  put  forth  all  their  strength.  The 
sled  held  as  though  it  were  an  anchor.  After 
two  efforts,  they  stood  still,  panting.  The 
whip  was  whistling  savagely,  when  once  more 
Mercedes  interfered.  She  dropped  on  her 
knees  before  Buck,  with  tears  in  her  eyes,  and 
put  her  arms  around  his  neck. 

"  You  poor,  poor  dears,"  she  cried  sympa 
thetically,  "why  don't  you  pull  hard?  —  then 
you  wouldn't  be  whipped."  Buck  did  not  like 
her,  but  he  was  feeling  too  miserable  to  resist 
her,  taking  it  as  part  of  the  day's  miserable 
work. 


THE  TOIL  OF  TRACE  AND  TRAIL     1 1 1 

One  of  the  onlookers,  who  had  been  clench 
ing  his  teeth  to  suppress  hot  speech,  now  spoke 
up:  — 

"  It's  not  that  I  care  a  whoop  what  becomes 
of  you,  but  for  the  dogs'  sakes  I  just  want  to 
tell  you,  you  can  help  them  a  mighty  lot  by 
breaking  out  that  sled.  The  runners  are  froze 
fast.  Throw  your  weight  against  the  gee-pole, 
right  and  left,  and  break  it  out." 

A  third  time  the  attempt  was  made,  but  this 
time,  following  the  advice,  Hal  broke  out  the 
runners  which  had  been  frozen  to  the  snow. 
The  overloaded  and  unwieldy  sled  forged 
ahead,  Buck  and  his  mates  struggling  frantically 
under  the  rain  of  blows.  A  hundred  yards 
ahead  the  path  turned  and  sloped  steeply  into 
the  mkin  street.  It  would  have  required  an  ex 
perienced  man  to  keep  the  top-heavy  sled  up 
right,  and  Hal  was  not  such  a  man.  As  they 
swung  on  the  turn  the  sled  went  over,  spilling 
half  its  load  through  the  loose  lashings.  The 
dogs  never  stopped.  The  lightened  sled 
bounded  on  its  side  behind  them.  They  were 
angry  because  of  the  ill  treatment  they  had  re- 


U2          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

ceived  and  the  unjust  load.  Buck  was  raging. 
He  broke  into  a  run,  the  team  following  his 
lead.  Hal  cried  "Whoa!  whoa!"  but  they 
gave  no  heed.  He  tripped  and  was  pulled  off 
his  feet.  The  capsized  sled  ground  over  him, 
and  the  dogs  dashed  on  up  the  street,  adding 
to  the  gayety  of  Skaguay  as  they  scattered  the 
remainder  of  the  outfit  along  its  chief  thorough 
fare. 

Kind-hearted  citizens  caught  the  dogs  and 
gathered  up  the  scattered  belongings.  Also 
they  gave  advice.  Half  the  load  and  twice  the 
dogs,  if  they  ever  expected  to  reach  Dawson, 
was  what  was  said.  Hal  and  his  sister  and 
brother-in-law  listened  unwillingly,  pitched  tent, 
and  overhauled  the  outfit.  Canned  goods  were 
turned  out  that  made  men  laugh,  for  canned 
goods  on  the  Long  Trail  is  a  thing  to  dream 
about.  "  Blankets  for  a  hotel,"  quoth  one  of 
the  men  who  laughed  and  helped.  "  Half  as 
many  is  too  much;  get  rid  of  them.  Throw 
away  that  tent,  and  all  those  dishes, —  who's 
going  to  wash  them,  anyway?  Good  Lord,  do 
you  think  you're  travelling  on  a  Pullman?  " 


THE  TOIL  OF  TRACE  AND  TRAIL     113 

And  so  it  went,  the  inexorable  elimination  of 
the  superfluous.  Mercedes  cried  when  her 
clothes-bag  were  dumped  on  the  ground  and 
article  after  article  was  thrown  out.  She  cried 
in  general,  and  she  cried  in  particular  over  each 
discarded  thing.  She  clasped  hands  about 
knees,  rocking  back  and  forth  broken-heartedly. 
She  averred  she  would  not  go  an  inch,  not  for 
a  dozen  Charleses.  She  appealed  to  every 
body  and  to  everything,  finally  wiping  her  eyes 
and  proceeding  to  cast  out  even  articles  of  ap 
parel  that  were  imperative  necessaries.  And 
in  her  zeal,  when  she  had  finished  with  her  own, 
she  attacked  the  belongings  of  her  men  and 
went  through  them  like  a  tornado. 

This  accomplished,  the  outfit,  though  cut  in 
half,  was  still  a  formidable  bulk.  Charles  and 
Hal  went  out  in  the  evening  and  brought  six 
Outside  dogs.  These,  added  to  the  six  of  the 
original  team,  and  Teek  and  Koona,  the  huskies 
obtained  at  the  Rink  Rapids  on  the  record  trip, 
brought  the  team  up  to  fourteen.  But  the  Out 
side  dogs,  though  practically  broken  in  since 
their  landing,  did  not  amount  to  much.  Three 


1 14         THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

were  short-haired  pointers,  one  was  a  New- 
foundland,  and  the  other  two  were  mongrels  of 
indeterminate  breed.  They  did  not  seem  to 
know  anything,  these  newcomers.  Buck  and 
his  comrades  looked  upon  them  with  disgust, 
and  though  he  speedily  taught  them  their  places 
and  what  not  to  do,  he  could  not  teach  them 
what  to  do.  They  did  not  take  kindly  to  trace 
and  trail.  With  the  exception  of  the  two  mon 
grels,  they  were  bewildered  and  spirit-broken 
by  the  strange  savage  environment  in  which 
they  found  themselves  and  by  the  ill  treatment 
they  had  received.  The  two  mongrels  were 
without  spirit  at  all;  bones  were  the  only  things 
breakable  about  them. 

With  the  newcomers  hopeless  and  forlorn, 
and  the  old  team  worn  out  by  twenty-five  hun 
dred  miles  of  continuous  trail,  the  outlook  was 
anything  but  bright.  The  two  men,  however, 
were  quite  cheerful.  And  they  were  proud, 
too.  They  were  doing  the  thing  in  style,  with 
fourteen  dogs.  They  had  seen  other  sleds  de 
part  over  the  Pass  for  Dawson,  or  come  in  from 
Dawson,  but  never  had  they  seen  a  sled  with  so 


THE  TOIL  OF  TRACE  AND  TRAIL     115 

many  as  fourteen  dogs.  In  the  nature  of  Arctic 
travel  there  was  a  reason  why  fourteen  dogs 
should  not  drag  one  sled,  and  that  was  that 
one  sled  could  not  carry  the  food  for  fourteen 
dogs.  But  Charles  and  Hal  did  not  know  this. 
They  had  worked  the  trip  out  with  a  pencil,  so 
much  to  a  dog,  so  many  dogs,  so  many  days, 
Q.  E.  D.  Mercedes  looked  over  their  shoul 
ders  and  nodded  comprehensively,  it  was  all  so 
very  simple. 

Late  next  morning  Buck  led  the  long  team 
up  the  street.  There  was  nothing  lively  about 
it,  no  snap  or  go  in  him  and  his  fellows.  They 
were  starting  dead  weary.  Four  times  he  had 
covered  the  distance  between  Salt  Water  and 
Dawson,  and  the  knowledge  that,  jaded  and 
tired,  he  was  facing  the  same  trail  once  more, 
made  him  bitter.  His  heart  was  not  in  the 
work,  nor  was  the  heart  of  any  dog.  The  Out- 
sides  were  timid  and  frightened,  the  Insides 
without  confidence  in  their  masters. 

Buck  felt  vaguely  that  there  was  no  depend 
ing  upon  these  two  men  and  the  woman.  They 
did  not  know  how  to  do  anything,  and  as  the 


Il6          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

days  went  by  it  became  apparent  that  they 
could  not  learn.  They  were  slack  in  all  things, 
without  order  or  discipline.  It  took  them  half 
the  night  to  pitch  a  slovenly  camp,  and  half  the 
morning  to  break  that  camp  and  get  the  sled 
loaded  in  fashion  so  slovenly  that  for  the  rest 
of  the  day  they  were  occupied  in  stopping  and 
rearranging  the  load.  Some  days  they  did  not 
make  ten  miles.  On  other  days  they  were  un 
able  to  get  started  at  all.  And  on  no  day  did 
they  succeed  in  making  more  than  half  the  dis 
tance  used  by  the  men  as  a  basis  in  their  dog- 
food  computation. 

It  was  inevitable  that  they  should  go  short 
on  dog-food.  But  they  hastened  it  by  over 
feeding,  bringing  the  day  nearer  when  under 
feeding  would  commence.  The  Outside  dogs, 
whose  digestions  had  not  been  trained  by 
chronic  famine  to  make  the  most  of  little,  had 
voracious  appetites.  And  when,  in  addition  to 
this,  the  worn-out  huskies  pulled  weakly,  Hal 
decided  that  the  orthodox  ration  was  too  small. 
He  doubled  it.  And  to  cap  it  all,  when  Mer 
cedes,  with  tears  in  her  pretty  eyes  and  a  quaver 


THE  TOIL  OF  TRACE  AND  TRAIL     117 

in  her  throat,  could  not  cajole  him  into  giving 
the  dogs  still  more,  she  stole  from  the  fish- 
sacks  and  fed  them  slyly.  But  it  was  not  food 
that  Buck  and  the  huskies  needed,  but  rest. 
And  though  they  were  making  poor  time,  the 
heavy  load  they  dragged  sapped  their  strength 
severely. 

Then  came  the  underfeeding.  Hal  awoke 
one  day  to  the  fact  that  his  dog-food  was  half 
gone  and  the  distance  only  quarter  covered; 
further,  that  for  love  or  money  no  additional 
dog-food  was  to  be  obtained.  '  So  he  cut  down 
even  the  orthodox  ration  and  tried  to  increase 
the  day's  travel.  His  sister  and  brother-in-law 
seconded  him;  but  they  were  frustrated  by  their 
heavy  outfit  and  their  own  incompetence.  It 
was  a  simple  matter  to  give  the  dogs  less  food; 
but  it  was  impossible  to  make  the  dogs  travel 
faster,  while  their  own  inability  to  get  under 
way  earlier  in  the  morning  prevented  them 
from  travelling  longer  hours.  Not  only  did 
they  not  know  how  to  work  dogs,  but  they  did 
not  know  how  to  work  themselves. 

The  first  to  go  was  Dub.     Poor  blundering 


Ii8          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

thief  that  he  was,  always  getting  caught  and 
punished,  he  had  none  the  less  been  a  faithful 
worker.  His  wrenched  shoulder-blade,  un 
treated  and  unrested,  went  from  bad  to  worse, 
till  finally  Hal  shot  him  with  the  big  Colt's  re 
volver.  It  is  a  saying  of  the  country  that  an 
Outside  dog  starves  to  death  on  the  ration  of 
the  husky,  so  the  six  Outside  dogs  under  Buck 
could  do  no  less  than  die  on  half  the  ration  of 
the  husky.  The  Newfoundland  went  first,  fol 
lowed  by  the  three  short-haired  pointers,  the 
two  mongrels  hanging  more  grittily  on  to  life, 
but  going  in  the  end. 

By  this  time  all  the  amenities  and  gentle 
nesses  of  the  Southland  had  fallen  away  from 
the  three  people.  Shorn  of  its  glamour  and 
romance,  Arctic  travel  became  to  them  a  reality 
too  harsh  for  their  manhood  and  womanhood. 
Mercedes  ceased  weeping  over  the  dogs,  being 
too  occupied  with  weeping  over  herself  and 
with  quarrelling  with  her  husband  and  brother. 
To  quarrel  was  the  one  thing  they  were 
never  too  weary  to  do.  Their  irritability  arose 
out  of  their  misery,  increased  with  it,  doubled 


THE  TOIL  OF  TRACE  AND  TRAIL     119 

upon  it,  outdistanced  it.  The  wonderful  pa 
tience  of  the  trail  which  comes  to  men  who 
toil  hard  and  suffer  sore,  and  remain  sweet  of 
speech  and  kindly,  did  not  come  to  these  two 
men  and  the  woman.  They  had  no  inkling  of 
such  a  patience.  They  were  stiff  and  in  pain; 
their  muscles  ached,  their  bones  ached,  their 
very  hearts  ached;  and  because  of  this  they  be 
came  sharp  of  speech,  and  hard  words  were 
first  on  their  lips  in  the  morning  and  last  at 
night. 

Charles  and  Hal  wrangled  whenever  Mer 
cedes  gave  them  a  chance.  It  was  the  cher 
ished  belief  of  each  that  he.  did  more  than  his 
share  of  the  work,  and  neither  forbore  to 
speak  this  belief  at  every  opportunity.  Some 
times  Mercedes  sided  with  her  husband,  some 
times  with  her  brother.  The  result  was  a 
beautiful  and  unending  family  quarrel.  Start 
ing  from  a  dispute  as  to  which  should  chop  a 
few  sticks  for  the  fire  (a  dispute  which  con 
cerned  only  Charles  and  Hal),  presently  would 
be  lugged  in  the  rest  of  the  family,  fathers, 
mothers,  uncles,  cousins,  people  thousands  of 


120          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

miles  away,  and  some  of  them  dead.  That 
Hal's  views  on  art,  or  the  sort  of  society  plays 
his  mother's  brother  wrote,  should  have  any 
thing  to  do  with  the  chopping  of  a  few  sticks  of 
firewood,  passes  comprehension;  nevertheless 
the  quarrel  was  as  likely  to  tend  in  that  direc 
tion  as  in  the  direction  of  Charles's  political 
prejudices.  And  that  Charles's  sister's  tale 
bearing  tongue  should  be  relevant  to  the  build 
ing  of  a  Yukon  fire,  was  apparent  only  to  Mer 
cedes,  who  disburdened  herself  of  copious  opin 
ions  upon  that  topic,  and  incidentally  upon  a  few 
other  traits  unpleasantly  peculiar  to  her  hus 
band's  family.  In  the  meantime  the  fire  re 
mained  unbuilt,  the  camp  half  pitched,  and 
the  dogs  unfed. 

Mercedes  nursed  a  special  grievance  —  the 
grievance  of  sex.  She  was  pretty  and  soft,  and 
had  been  chivalrously  treated  all  her  days. 
But  the  present  treatment  by  her  husband  and 
brother  was  everything  save  chivalrous.  It 
was  her  custom  to  be  helpless.  They  com 
plained.  Upon  which  impeachment  of  what  to 
her  was  her  most  essential  sex-prerogative,  she 


THE  TOIL  OF  TRACE  AND  TRAIL     121 

made  their  lives  unendurable.  She  no  longer 
considered  the  dogs,  and  because  she  was  sore 
and  tired,  she  persisted  in  riding  on  the  sled. 
She  was  pretty  and  soft,  but  she  weighed  one 
hundred  and  twenty  pounds  —  a  lusty  last  straw 
to  the  load  dragged  by  the  weak  and  starving 
animals.  She  rode  for  days,  till  they  fell  in 
the  traces  and  the  sled  stood  still.  Charles  and 
Hal  begged  her  to  get  off  and  walk,  pleaded 
with  her,  entreated,  the  while  she  wept  and  im 
portuned  Heaven  with  a  recital  of  their  bru 
tality. 

On  one  occasion  they  took  her  off  the  sled  by 
main  strength.  They  never  did  it  again.  She 
let  her  legs  go  limp  like  a  spoiled  child,  and  sat 
down  on  the  trail.  They  went  on  their  way, 
but  she  did  not  move.  After  they  had  travelled 
three  miles  they  unloaded  the  sled,  came  back 
for  her,  and  by  main  strength  put  her  on  the 
sled  again. 

In  the  excess  of  their  own  misery  they  were 
callous  to  the  suffering  of  their  animals.  Hal's 
theory,  which  le  practised  on  others,  was  that 
one  must  get  hardened.  He  had  started  out 


322         THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

preaching  it  to  his  sister  and  brother-in-law. 
Failing  there,  he  hammered  it  into  the  dogs 
with  a  club.  At  the  Five  Fingers  the  dog-food 
gave  out,  and  a  toothless  old  squaw  offered  to 
trade  them  a  few  pounds  of  frozen  horse-hide 
for  the  Colt's  revolver  that  kept  the  big  hunt 
ing-knife  company  at  Hal's  hip.  A  poor  sub 
stitute  for  food  was  this  hide,  just  as  it  had 
been  stripped  from  the  starved  horses  of  the 
cattlemen  six  months  back.  In  its  frozen  state 
it  was  more  like  strips  of  galvanized  iron,  and 
when  a  dog  wrestled  it  into  his  stomach  it 
thawed  into  thin  and  innutritious  leathery 
strings  and  into  a  mass  of  short  hair,  irritating 
and  indigestible. 

And  through  it  all  Buck  staggered  along  at 
the  head  of  the  team  as  in  a  nightmare.  He 
pulled  when  he  could;  when  he  could  no  longer 
pull,  he  fell  down  and  remained  down  til;  blows 
from  whip  or  club  drove  him  to  his  feet  again. 
All  the  stiffness  and  gloss  had  gone  out  of  his 
beautiful  furry  coat.  The  hair  hung  down, 
limp  and  draggled,  or  matted  with  dried  blood 
where  Hal's  club  had  bruised  him.  His  mus- 


THE  TOIL  OF  TRACE  AND  TRAIL     123 

cles  had  wasted  away  to  knotty  strings,  and  the 
flesh  pads  had  disappeared,  so  that  each  rib 
and  every  bone  in  his  frame  were  outlined 
cleanly  through  the  loose  hide  that  was  wrinkled 
in  folds  of  emptiness.  It  was  heartbreaking, 
only  Buck's  heart  was  unbreakable.  The  man 
in  the  red  sweater  had  proved  that. 

As  it  was  with  Buck,  so  was  it  with  his  mates 
They  were  perambulating  skeletons.  Therp 
were  seven  all  together,  including  him.  In 
their  very  great  misery  they  had  become  insen 
sible  to  the  bite  of  the  lash  or  the  bruise  of  the 
club.  The  pain  of  the  beating  was  dull  and  dis 
tant,  just  as  the  things  their  eyes  saw  and  their 
ears  heard  seemed  dull  and  distant.  They 
were  not  half  living,  or  quarter  living.  They 
were  simply  so  many  bags  of  bones  in  which 
sparks  of  life  fluttered  faintly.  When  a  halt 
was  made,  they  dropped  down  in  the  traces 
like  dead  dogs,  and  the  spark  dimmed  and 
paled  and  seemed  to  go  out.  And  when  the 
club  or  whip  fell  upon  them,  the  spark  fluttered 
feebly  up,  and  they  tottered  to  their  feet  and 
staggered  on. 


124          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

There  came  a  day  when  Billee,  the  good- 
natured,  fell  and  could  not  rise.  Hal  had 
traded  off  his  revolver,  so  he  took  the  axe  and 
knocked  Billee  on  the  head  as  he  lay  in  the 
traces,  then  cut  the  carcass  out  of  the  harness 
and  dragged  it  to  one  side.  Buck  saw,  and  his 
mates  saw,  and  they  knew  that  this  thing  was 
very  close  to  them.  On  the  next  day  Koona 
went,  and  but  five  of  them  remained:  Joe,  too 
far  gone  to  be  malignant;  Pike,  crippled  and 
limping,  only  half  conscious  and  not  conscious 
enough  longer  to  malinger;  Sol-leks,  the  one- 
eyed,  still  faithful  to  the  toil  of  trace  and  trail, 
and  mournful  in  that  he  had  so  little  strength 
with  which  to  pull;  Teek,  who  had  not  travelled 
so  far  that  winter  and  who  was  now  beaten 
more  than  the  others  because  he  was  fresher; 
and  Buck,  still  at  the  head  of  the  team,  but  no 
longer  enforcing  discipline  or  striving  to  en 
force  it,  blind  with  weakness  half  the  time  and 
keeping  the  trail  by  the  loom  of  it  and  by  the 
dim  feel  of  his  feet. 

It  was  beautiful  spring  weather,  but  neither 
dogs  nor  humans  were  aware  of  it.  Each  day 


THE  TOIL  OF  TRACE  AND  TRAIL     125 

the  sun  rose  earlier  and  set  later.  It  was 
dawn  by  three  in  the  morning,  and  twilight 
lingered  till  nine  at  night.  The  whole  long 
day  was  a  blaze  of  sunshine.  The  ghostly 
winter  silence  had  given  way  to  the  great  spring 
murmur  of  awakening  life.  This  murmur 
arose  from  all  the  land,  fraught  with  the  joy 
of  living.  It  came  from  the  things  that  lived 
and  moved  again,  things  which  had  been  as 
dead  and  which  had  not  moved  during  the  long 
months  of  frost.  The  sap  was  rising  in  the 
pines.  The  willows  and  aspens  were  bursting 
out  in  young  buds.  Shrubs  and  vines  were  put 
ting  on  fresh  garbs  of  green.  Crickets  sang  in 
the  nights,  and  in  the  days  all  manner  of  creep 
ing,  crawling  things  rustled  forth  into  the  sun. 
Partridges  and  woodpeckers  were  booming  and 
knocking  in  the  forest.  Squirrels  were  chatter 
ing,  birds  singing}  and  overhead  honked  the 
wild-fowl  driving  up  from  the  south  in  cunning 
wedges  that  split  the  air. 

From  every  hill  slope  came  the  trickle  of 
running  water,  the  music  of  unseen  fountains. 
All  things  were  thawing,  bending,  snapping. 


126    THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

The  Yukon  was  straining  to  break  loose  the  iee 
that  bound  it  down.  It  ate  away  from  beneath ; 
the  sun  ate  from  above.  Air-holes  formed, 
fissures  sprang  and  spread  apart,  while  thin 
sections  of  ice  fell  through  bodily  into  the  river. 
And  amid  all  this  bursting,  rending,  throbbing 
of  awakening  life,  under  the  blazing  sun  and 
through  the  soft-sighing  breezes,  like  wayfarers 
to  death,  staggered  the  two  men,  the  woman, 
and  the  huskies. 

With  the  dogs  falling,  Mercedes  weeping  and 
riding,  Hal  swearing  innocuously,  and  Charles's 
eyes  wistfully  watering,  they  staggered  into 
John  Thornton's  camp  at  the  mouth  of  the 
White  River.  When  they  halted,  the  dogs 
dropped  down  as  though  they  had  all  been 
struck  dead.  Mercedes  dried  her  eyes  and 
looked  at  John  Thornton.  Charles  sat  down 
on  a  log  to  rest.  He  sat  down  very  slowly  and 
painstakingly  what  of  his  great  stiffness.  Hal 
did  the  talking.  John  Thornton  was  whittling 
the  last  touches  on  an  axe-handle  he  had  made 
from  a  stick  of  birch.  He  whittled  and  lis 
tened,  gave  monosyllabic  replies,  and,  when  it 


THE  TOIL  OF  TRACE  AND  TRAIL     127 

was  asked,  terse  advice.  He  knew  the  breed, 
and  he  gave  his  advice  in  the  certainty  that  it 
would  not  be  followed. 

4  They  told  us  up  above  that  the  bottom 
was  dropping  out  of  the  trail  and  that  the  best 
thing  for  us  to  do  was  to  lay  over,"  Hal  said 
in  response  to  Thornton's  warning  to  take  no 
more  chances  on  the  rotten  ice.  "  They  told 
us  we  couldn't  make  White  River,  and  here 
we  are."  This  last  with  a  sneering  ring  of  tri 
umph  in  it. 

"  And  they  told  you  true,"  John  Thornton 
answered.  "  The  bottom's  likely  to  drop  out 
at  any  moment.  Only  fools,  with  the  blind 
luck  of  fools,  could  have  made  it.  I  tell  you 
straight,  I  wouldn't  risk  my  carcass  on  that  ice 
for  all  the  gold  in  Alaska." 

"  That's  because  you're  not  a  fool,  I  sup 
pose,"  said  Hal.  "  All  the  same,  we'll  go  on 
to  Dawson."  He  uncoiled  his  whip.  "  Get  up 
there,  Buck!  Hi!  Get  up  there!  Mush 
on!" 

Thornton  went  on  whittling.  It  was  idle, 
he  knew,  to  get  between  a  fool  and  his  folly; 


128          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

while  two  or  three  fools  more  or  less  would 
not  alter  the  scheme  of  things. 

But  the  team  did  not  get  up  at  the  command. 
It  had  long  since  passed  into  the  stage  where 
blows  were  required  to  rouse  it.  The  whip 
flashed  out,  here  and  there,  on  its  merciless  er 
rands.  John  Thornton  compressed  his  lips. 
Sol-leks  was  the  first  to  crawl  to  his  feet.  Teek 
followed.  Joe  came  next,  yelping  with  pain. 
Pike  made  painful  efforts.  Twice  he  fell  over, 
when  half  up,  and  on  the  third  attempt  man 
aged  to  rise.  Buck  made  no  effort.  He  lay 
quietly  where  he  had  fallen.  The  lash  bit  into 
him  again  and  again,  but  he  neither  whined  nor 
struggled.  Several  times  Thornton  started,  as 
though  to  speak,  but  changed  his  mind.  A 
moisture  came  into  his  eyes,  and,  as  the  whip 
ping  continued,  he  arose  and  walked  irresolutely 
up  and  down. 

This  was  the  first  time  Buck  had  failed,  in 
itself  a  sufficient  reason  to  drive  Hal  into  a  rage. 
He  exchanged  the  whip  for  the  customary  club. 
Buck  refused  to  move  under  the  rain  of  heavier 
blows  which  now  fell  upon  him.  Like  his 


THE  TOIL  OF  TRACE  AND  TRAIL     129 

mates,  he  was  barely  able  to  get  up,  but,  unlike 
them,  he  had  made  up  his  mind  not  to  get  up. 
He  had  a  vague  feeling  of  impending  doom. 
This  had  been  strong  upon  him  when  he  pulled 
in  to  the  bank,  and  it  had  not  departed  from 
him.  What  of  the  thin  and  rotten  ice  he  had 
felt  under  his  feet  all  day,  it  seemed  that  he 
sensed  disaster  close  at  hand,  out  there  ahead 
on  the  ice  where  his  master  was  trying  to  drive 
him.  He  refused  to  stir.  So  greatly  had  he 
suffered,  and  so  far  gone  was  he,  that  the 
blows  did  not  hurt  much.  And  as  they  con 
tinued  to  fall  upon  him,  the  spark  of  life  within 
flickered  and  went  down.  It  was  nearly  out. 
He  felt  strangely  numb.  As  though  from  a 
great  distance,  he  was  aware  that  he  was  being 
beaten.  The  last  sensations  of  pain  left  him. 
He  no  longer  felt  anything,  though  very  faintly 
he  could  hear  the  impact  of  the  club  upon  his 
body.  But  it  was  no  longer  his  body,  it  seemed 
so  far  away. 

And  then,  suddenly,  without  warning,  utter 
ing  a  cry  that  was  inarticulate  and  more  like 
the  cry  of  an  animal,  John  Thornton  sprang 


I3o          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

upon  the  man  who  wielded  the  club.  Hal  was 
hurled  backward,  as  though  struck  by  a  falling 
tree.  Mercedes  screamed.  Charles  looked 
on  wistfully,  wiped  his  watery  eyes,  but  did  not 
get  up  because  of  his  stiffness. 

John  Thornton  stood  over  Buck,  struggling 
to  control  himself,  too  convulsed  with  rage  to 
speak. 

"  If  you  strike  that  dog  again,  I'll  kill  you," 
he  at  last  managed  to  say  in  a  choking  voice. 

"It's  my  dog,"  Hal  replied,  wiping  the  blood 
from  his  mouth  as  he  came  back.  "  Get  out 
of  my  way,  or  I'll  fix  you.  I'm  going  to  Daw- 


son." 


Thornton  stood  between  him  and  Buck,  and 
evinced  no  intention  of  getting  out  of  the  way. 
Hal  drew  his  long  hunting-knife.  Mercedes 
screamed,  cried,  laughed,  and  manifested  the 
chaotic  abandonment  of  hysteria.  Thornton 
rapped  Hal's  knuckles  with  the  axe-handle, 
knocking  the  knife  to  the  ground.  He  rapped 
his  knuckles  again  as  he  tried  to  pick  it  up. 
Then  he  stooped,  picked  it  up  himself,  and  with 
two  strokes  cut  Buck's  traces. 


THE  TOIL  OF  TRACE  AND  TRAIL     131 

Hal  had  no  fight  left  in  him.  Besides,  his 
hands  were  full  with  his  sister,  or  his  arms, 
rather;  while  Buck  was  too  near  dead  to  be 
of  further  use  in  hauling  the  sled.  A  few 
minutes  later  they  pulled  out  from  the  bank  and 
down  the  river.  Buck  heard  them  go  and 
raised  his  head  to  see.  Pike  was  leading,  Sol- 
leks  was  at  the  wheel,  and  between  were  Joe 
and  Teek.  They  were  limping  and  staggering. 
Mercedes  was  riding  the  loaded  sled.  Hal 
guided  at  the  gee-pole,  and  Charles  stumbled 
along  in  the  rear. 

As  Buck  watched  them,  Thornton  knelt  be 
side  him  and  with  rough,  kindly  hands  searched 
for  broken  bones.  By  the  time  his  search  had 
disclosed  nothing  more  than  many  bruises  and 
a  state  of  terrible  starvation,  the  sled  was  a 
quarter  of  a  mile  away.  Dog  and  man  watched 
it  crawling  along  over  the  ice.  Suddenly,  they 
saw  its  back  end  drop  down  as  into  a  rut,  and 
the  gee-pole,  with  Hal  clinging  to  it,  jerk  into 
the  air.  Mercedes's  scream  came  to  their  ears. 
They  saw  Charles  turn  and  make  one  step  to 
run  back,  and  then  a  whole  section  of  ice  give 


I3 2          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

way  and  dogs  and  humans  disappear.  A 
yawning  hole  was  all  that  was  to  be  seen.  The 
bottom  had  dropped  out  of  the  trail. 

John  Thornton  and  Buck  looked  at  each 
other. 

"  You  poor  devil,"  said  John  Thornton,  and 
Buck  licked  his  hand. 


VI 
FOR  THE  LOVE  OF  A  MAN 


VI 

For  the  Love  of  a  Man 

WHEN  John  Thornton  froze  his  feet 
in  the  previous  December,  his  part 
ners  had  made  him  comfortable  and 
left  him  to  get  well,  going  on  themselves  up 
the  river  to  get  out  a  raft  of  saw-logs  for  Daw- 
son.  He  was  still  limping  slightly  at  the  time 
he  rescued  Buck,  but  with  the  continued  warm 
weather  even  the  slight  limp  left  him.  And 
here,  lying  by  the  river  bank  through  the  long 
spring  days,  watching  the  running  water,  listen 
ing  lazily  to  the  songs  of  birds  and  the  hum  of 
nature,  Buck  slowly  won  back  his  strength. 

A  rest  comes  very  good  after  one  has  trav 
elled  three  thousand  miles,  and  it  must  be  con 
fessed  that  Buck  waxed  lazy  as  his  wounds 
healed,  his  muscles  swelled  out>,  and  the  flesh 
came  back  to  cover  his  bones.  For  that  matter, 

i3S 


136         THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

they  were  all  loafing, —  Buck,  John  Thornton, 
and  Skeet  and  Nig, —  waiting  for  the  raft  to 
come  that  was  to  carry  them  down  to  Dawson. 
Skeet  was  a  little  Irish  setter  who  early  made 
friends  with  Buck,  who,  in  a  dying  condition, 
was  unable  to  resent  her  first  advances.  She 
had  the  doctor  trait  which  some  dogs  possess; 
and  as  a  mother  cat  washes  her  kittens,  so  she 
washed  and  cleansed  Buck's  wounds.  Regu 
larly,  each  morning  after  he  had  finished  his 
breakfast,  she  performed  her  self-appointed 
task,  till  he  came  to  look  for  her  ministrations 
as  much  as  he  did  for  Thornton's.  Nig,  equally 
friendly,  though  less  demonstrative,  was  a 
huge  black  dog,  half  bloodhound  and  half  deer- 
hound,  with  eyes  that  laughed  and  a  boundless 
good  nature. 

To  Buck's  surprise  these  dogs  manifested  no 
jealousy  toward  him.  They  seemed  to  share 
the  kindliness  and  largeness  of  John  Thornton. 
As  Buck  grew  stronger  they  enticed  him  into 
all  sorts  of  ridiculous  games,  in  which  Thorn 
ton  himself  could  not  forbear  to  join;  and  in 
this  fashion  Buck  romped  through  his  conva- 


FOR  THE  LOVE  OF  A  MAN         137 

lescence  and  into  a  new  existence.  Love,  genu 
ine  passionate  love,  was  his  for  the  first  time. 
This  he  had  never  experienced  at  Judge  Mil 
ler's  down  in  the  sun-kissed  Santa  Clara  Valley. 
With  the  Judge's  sons,  hunting  and  tramping, 
it  had  been  a  working  partnership;  with  the 
Judge's  grandsons,  a  sort  of  pompous  guar 
dianship;  and  with  the  Judge  himself,  a  stately 
and  dignified  friendship.  But  love  that  was 
feverish  and  burning,  that  was  adoration,  that 
was  madness,  it  had  taken  John  Thornton  to 
arouse. 

This  man  had  saved  his  life,  which  was  some 
thing;  but,  further,  he  was  the  ideal  master. 
Other  men  saw  to  the  welfare  of  their  dogs 
from  a  sense  of  duty  and  business  expediency; 
he  s^w  to  the  welfare  of  his  as  if  they  were 
his  own  children,  because  he  could  not  help  it. 
And  he  saw  further.  He  never  forgot  a  kindly 
greeting  or  a  cheering  word,  and  to  sit  down 
for  a  long  talk  with  them  ("  gas  "  he  called  it) 
was  as  much  his  delight  as  theirs.  He  had  a 
way  of  taking  Buck's  head  roughly  between 
his  hands,  and  resting  his  own  head  upon  Buck's, 


138          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

of  shaking  him  back  and  forth,  the  while  call 
ing  him  ill  names  that  to  Buck  were  love  names. 
Buck  knew  no  greater  joy  than  that  rough  em 
brace  and  the  sound  of  murmured  oaths,  and 
at  each  jerk  back  and  forth  it  seemed  that  his 
heart  would  be  shaken  out  of  his  body  so  great 
was  its  ecstasy.  And  when,  released,  he  sprang 
to  his  feet,  his  mouth  laughing,  his  eyes  elo 
quent,  his  throat  vibrant  with  unuttered  sound, 
and  in  that  fashion  remained  without  move 
ment,  John  Thornton  would  reverently  ex 
claim,  "God!  you  can  all  but  speak!  " 

Buck  had  a  trick  of  love  expression  that  was 
akin  to  hurt.  He  would  often  seize  Thornton's 
hand  in  his  mouth  and  close  so  fiercely  that 
the  flesh  bore  the  impress  of  his  teeth  for  some 
time  afterward.  And  as  Buck  understood  the 
oaths  to  be  love  words,  so  the  man  understood 
this  feigned  bite  for  a  caress. 

For  the  most  part,  however,  Buck's  love 
was  expressed  in  adoration.  While  he  went 
wild  with  happiness  when  Thornton  touched 
him  or  spoke  to  him,  he  did  not  seek  these 
tokens.  Unlike  Skeet,  who  was  wont  to  shove 


FOR  THE  LOVE  OF  A  MAN        139 

her  nose  under  Thornton's  hand  and  nudge  and 
nudge  till  petted,  or  Nig,  who  would  stalk  up 
and  rest  his  great  head  on  Thornton's  knee, 
Buck  was  content  to  adore  at  a  distance.  He 
would  lie  by  the  hour,  eager,  alert,  at  Thorn 
ton's  feet,  looking  up  into  his  face,  dwelling 
upon  it,  studying  it,  following  with  keenest  in 
terest  each  fleeting  expression,  every  movement 
or  change  of  feature.  Or,  as  chance  might 
have  it,  he  would  lie  farther  away,  to  the  side  or 
rear,  watching  the  outlines  of  the  man  and  the 
occasional  movements  of  his  body.  And  often, 
such  was  the  communion  in  which  they  lived, 
the  strength  of  Buck's  gaze  would  draw  John 
Thornton's  head  around,  and  he  would  return 
the  gaze,  without  speech,  his  heart  shining  out 
of  his  eyes  as  Buck's  heart  shone  out. 

For  a  long  time  after  his  rescue,  Buck  did 
not  like  Thornton  to  get  out  of  his  sight. 
From  the  moment  he  left  the  tent  to  when  he 
entered  it  again,  Buck  would  follow  at  his 
heels.  His  transient  masters  since  he  had 
come  into  the  Northland  had  bred  in  him  a 
fear  that  no  master  could  be  permanent.  He 


1 40          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

was  afraid  that  Thornton  would  pass  out  of  his 
life  as  Perrault  and  Francois  and  the  Scotch 
half-breed  had  passed  out.  Even  in  the  night, 
in  his  dreams,  he  was  haunted  by  this  fear. 
At  such  times  he  would  shake  off  sleep  and 
creep  through  the  chill  to  the  flap  of  the  tent, 
where  he  would  stand  and  listen  to  the  sound 
of  his  master's  breathing. 

But  in  spite  of  this  great  love  he  bore  John 
Thornton,  which  seemed  to  bespeak  'he  soft 
civilizing  influence,  the  strain  of  the  primitive, 
which  the  Northland  had  aroused  in  him,  re 
mained  alive  and  active.  Faithfulness  and  de 
votion,  things  born  of  fire  and  roof,  were  his, 
yet  he  retained  his  wildness  and  wiliness.  He 
was  a  thing  of  the  wild,  come  in  from  the  wild 
to  sit  by  John  Thornton's  fire,  rather  than  a 
dog  of  the  soft  Southland  stamped  with  the 
marks  of  generations  of  civilization.  Because 
of  his  very  great  love,  he  could  not  steal  from 
this  man,  -but  from  any  other  man,  in  any 
other  camp,  he  did  not  hesitate  an  instant; 
while  the  cunning  with  which  he  stole  enabled 
him  to  escape  detection. 


FOR  THE  LOVE  OF  A  MAN         141 

His  face  and  body  were  scored  by  the  teeth 
of  many  dogs,  and  he  fought  as  fiercely  as  ever 
and  more  shrewdly.  Skeet  and  Nig  were  too 
good-natured  for  quarrelling, —  besides,  they 
belonged  to  John  Thornton;  but  the  strange 
dog,  no  matter  what  the  breed  or  valor,  swiftly 
acknowledged  Buck's  supremacy  or  found  him 
self  struggling  for  life  with  a  terrible  antagonist. 
And  Buck  was  merciless.  He  had  learned 
well  the  law  of  club  anc  fang,  and  he  never 
forewent  an  advantage  or  drew  back  from  a 
foe  he  had  started  on  the  way  to  Death.  He 
had  lessoned  from  Spitz,  and  from  the  chief 
fighting  dogs  of  the  police  and  mail,  and  knew 
there  was  no  middle  course.  He  must  master 
or  be  mastered;  while  to  show  mercy  was  a 
weakness.  Mercy  did  not  exist  in  the  primor 
dial  life.  It  was  misunderstood  for  fear,  and 
such  misunderstandings  made  for  death.  Kill 
or  be  killed,  eat  or  be  eaten,  was  the  law;  and 
this  mandate,  down  out  of  the  depths  of  Time, 
he  obeyed. 

He  was  older  than  the  days  he  had  seen  and 
the  breaths  he  had  drawn.  He  linked  the  past 


1 42          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

with  the  present,  and  the  eternity  behind  him 
throbbed  through  him  in  a  mighty  rhythm  to 
which  he  swayed  as  the  tides  and  seasons 
swayed.  He  sat  by  John  Thornton's  fire,  a 
broad-breasted  dog,  white-fanged  and  long- 
furred;  but  behind  him  were  the  shades  of  all 
manner  of  dogs,  half-wolves  and  wild  wolves, 
urgent  and  prompting,  tasting  the  savor  of  the 
meat  he  ate,  thirsting  for  the  water  he  drank, 
scenting  the  wind  w'.h  him,  listening  with  him 
and  telling  him  the  sounds  made  by  the  wild 
life  in  the  forest,  dictating  his  moods,  directing 
his  actions,  lying  down  to  sleep  with  him  when 
he  lay  down,  and  dreaming  with  him  and  be 
yond  him  and  becoming  themselves  the  stuff 
of  his  dreams. 

So  peremptorily  did  these  shades  beckon  him, 
that  each  day  mankind  and  the  claims  of  man 
kind  slipped  farther  from  him.  Deep  in  the  , 
forest  a  call  was  sounding,  and  as  often  as  he 
heard  this  call,  mysteriously  thrilling  and  lur 
ing,  he  felt  compelled  to  turn  his  back  upon  the 
fire  and  the  beaten  earth  around  it,  and  to  plunge 
into  the  forest,  and  on  and  on,  he  knew  not 


FOR  THE  LOVE  OF  A  MAN         143 

where  or  why;  nor  did  he  wonder  where  or 
why,  the  call  sounding  imperiously,  deep  in  the 
forest.  But  as  often  as  he  gained  the  soft  un 
broken  earth  and  the  green  shade,  the  love  for 
John  Thornton  drew  him  back  to  the  fire 
again. 

Thornton  alone  held  him.  The  rest  of  man 
kind  was  as  nothing.  Chance  travellers  might 
praise  or  pet  him;  but  he  was  cold  under  it  all, 
and  from  a  too  demonstrative  man  he  would 
get  up  and  walk  away.  When  Thornton's 
partners,  Hans  and  Pete,  arrived  on  the  long- 
expected  raft,  Buck  refused  to  notice  them  till 
he  learned  they  were  close  to  Thornton;  after 
that  he  tolerated  them  in  a  passive  sort  of  way, 
accepting  favors  from  them  as  though  he  fa 
vored  them  by  accepting.  They  were  of  the 
same  large  type  as  Thornton,  living  close  to 
the  earth,  thinking  simply  and  seeing  clearly; 
and  ere  they  swung  the  raft  into  the  big  eddy  by 
the  saw-mill  at  Dawson,  they  understood  Buck 
and  his  ways,  and  did  not  insist  upon  an  in 
timacy  such  as  obtained  with  Skeet  and  Nig. 

For  Thornton,  however,  his  love  seemed  to 


144         THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

grow  and  grow.  He,  alone  among  men,  could 
put  a  pack  upon  Buck's  back  in  the  summer 
travelling.  Nothing  was  too  great  for  Buck  to 
do,  when  Thornton  commanded.  One  day 
(they  had  grub-staked  themselves  from  the  pro 
ceeds  of  the  raft  and  left  Dawson  for  the  head 
waters  of  the  Tanana)  the  men  and  dogs  were 
sitting  on  the  crest  of  a  cliff  which  fell  away, 
straight  down,  to  naked  bed-rock  three  hun 
dred  feet  below.  John  Thornton  was  sitting 
near  the  edge,  Buck  at  his  shoulder.  A 
thoughtless  whim  seized  Thornton,  and  he  drew 
the  attention  of  Hans  and  Pete  to  the  experi 
ment  he  had  in  mind.  "Jump,  Buck!"  he 
commanded,  sweeping  his  arm  out  and  over 
the  chasm.  The  next  instant  he  was  grappling 
with  Buck  on  the  extreme  edge,  while  Hans 
and  Pete  were  dragging  them  back  into  safety. 

"  It's  uncanny,"  Pete  said,  after  it  was  over 
and  they  had  caught  their  speech. 

Thornton  shook  his  head.  "  No,  it  is  splen 
did,  and  it  is  terrible,  too.  Do  you  know,  it 
sometimes  makes  me  afraid." 

"  I'm  not  hankering  to  be  the  man  that  lays 


FOR  THE  LOVE  OF  A  MAN         145 

hands  on  you  while  he's  around, "  Pete  an 
nounced  conclusively,  nodding  his  head  toward 
Buck. 

"  Py  Jingo !  "  was  Hans's  contribution. 
"  Not  mineself  either." 

It  was  at  Circle  City,  ere  the  year  was  out, 
that  Pete's  apprehensions  were  realized. 
"  Black "  Burton,  a  man  evil-tempered  and 
malicious,  had  been  picking  a  quarrel  with  a 
tenderfoot  at  the  bar,  when  Thornton  stepped 
good-naturedly  between.  Buck,  as  was  his  cus 
tom,  was  lying  in  a  corner,  head  on  paws,  watch 
ing  his  master's  every  action.  Burton  struck 
out,  without  warning,  straight  from  the  shoul 
der.  Thornton  was  sent  spinning,  and  saved 
himself  from  falling  only  by  clutching  the  rail 
of  the  bar. 

Those  who  were  looking  on  heard  what  was 
neither  bark  nor  yelp,  but  a  something  which 
is  best  described  as  a  roar,  and  they  saw  Buck's 
body  rise  up  in  the  air  as  he  left  the  floor  for 
Burton's  throat.  The  man  saved  his  life  by 
instinctively  throwing  out  his  arm,  but  was 
hurled  backward  to  the  floor  with  Buck  on  top 


146          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

of  him.  Buck  loosed  his  teeth  from  the  flesh 
of  the  arm  and  drove  in  again  for  the  throat. 
This  time  the  man  succeeded  only  in  partly 
blocking,  and  his  throat  was  torn  open.  Then 
the  crowd  was  upon  Buck,  and  he  was  driven 
off;  but  while  a  surgeon  checked  the  bleeding, 
he  prowled  up  and  down,  growling  furiously, 
attempting  to  rush  in,  and  being  forced  back  by 
an  array  of  hostile  clubs.  A  "  miners'  meet 
ing,"  called  on  the  spot,  decided  that  the  dog 
had  sufficient  provocation,  and  Buck  was  dis 
charged.  But  his  reputation  was  made,  and 
from  that  day  his  name  spread  through  every 
camp  in  Alaska. 

Later  on,  in  the  fall  of  the  year,  he  saved 
John  Thornton's  life  in  quite  another  fashion. 
The  three  partners  were  lining  a  long  and  nar 
row  poling-boat  down  a  bad  stretch  of  rapids 
on  the  Forty-Mile  Creek.  Hans  and  Pete 
moved  along  the  bank,  snubbing  with  a  thin 
Manila  rope  from  tree  to  tree,  while  Thornton 
remained  in  the  boat,  helping  its  descent  by 
means  of  a  pole,  and  shouting  directions  to  the 
shore.  Buck,  on  the  bank,  worried  and  anx- 


FOR  THE  LOVE  OF  A  MAN         147 

ious,  kept  abreast  of  the  boat,  his  eyes  never  off 
his  master. 

At  a  particularly  bad  spot,  where  a  ledge  of 
barely  submerged  rocks  jutted  out  into  the 
river,  Hans  cast  off  the  rope,  and,  while  Thorn 
ton  poled  the  boat  out  into  the  stream,  ran  down 
the  bank  with  the  end  in  his  hand  to  snub  the 
boat  when  it  had  cleared  the  ledge.  This  it 
did,  and  was  flying  down-stream  in  a  current  as 
swift  as  a  mill-race,  when  Hans  checked  it  with 
the  rope  and  checked  too  suddenly.  The  boat 
flirted  over  and  snubbed  in  to  the  bank  bottom 
up,  while  Thornton,  flung  sheer  out  of  it,  was 
carried  down-stream  toward  the  worst  part  of 
the  rapids,  a  stretch  of  wild  water  in  which  no 
swimmer  could  live. 

Buck  had  sprung  in  on  the  instant;  and  at 
the  end  of  three  hundred  yards,  amid  a  mad 
swirl  of  water,  he  overhauled  Thornton. 
When  he  felt  him  grasp  his  tail,  Buck  headed 
for  the  bank,  swimming  with  all  his  splendid 
strength.  But  the  progress  shoreward  was 
slow,  the  progress  down-stream  amazingly 
rapid.  From  below  came  the  fatal  roaring 


148          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

where  the  wild  current  went  wilder  and  was  rent 
in  shreds  and  spray  by  the  rocks  which  thrust 
through  like  the  teeth  of  an  enormous  comb. 
The  suck  of  the  water  as  it  took  the  beginning 
of  the  last  steep  pitch  was  frightful,  and  Thorn 
ton  knew  that  the  shore  was  impossible.  He 
scraped  furiously  over  a  rock,  bruised  across  a 
second,  and  struck  a  third  with  crushing  force. 
He  clutched  its  slippery  top  with  both  hands, 
releasing  Buck,  and  above  the  roar  of  the 
churning  water  shouted:  "  Go,  Buck!  Go!  " 

Buck  could  not  hold  his  own,  and  swept  on 
down-stream,  struggling  desperately,  but  unable 
to  win  back.  When  he  heard  Thornton's  com 
mand  repeated,  he  partly  reared  out  of  the 
water,  throwing  his  head  high,  as  though  for  a 
last  look,  then  turned  obediently  toward  the 
bank.  He  swam  powerfully  and  was  dragged 
ashore  by  Pete  and  Hans  at  the  very  point 
where  swimming  ceased  to  be  possible  and  de 
struction  began. 

They  knew  that  the  time  a  man  could  cling 
to  a  slippery  rock  in  the  face  of  that  driving 
current  was  a  matter  of  minutes,  and  they  ran 


FOR  THE  LOVE  OF  A  MAN        149 

as  fast  as  they  could  up  the  bank  to  a  point 
far  above  where  Thornton  was  hanging  on. 
They  attached  the  line  with  which  they  had 
been  snubbing  the  boat  to  Buck's  neck  and 
shoulders,  being  careful  that  it  should  neither 
strangle  him  nor  impede  his  swimming,  and 
launched  him  into  the  stream.  He  struck  out 
boldly,  but  not  straight  enough  into  the  stream. 
He  discovered  the  mistake  too  late,  when 
Thornton  was  abreast  of  him  and  a  bare  half- 
dozen  strokes  away  while  he  was  being  carried 
helplessly  past. 

Hans  promptly  snubbed  with  the  rope,  as 
though  Buck  were  a  boat.  The  rope  thus 
tightening  on  him  in  the  sweep  of  the  current, 
he  was  jerked  under  the  surface,  and  under  the 
surface  he  remained  till  his  body  struck  against 
the  bank  and  he  was  hauled  out.  He  was  half 
drowned,  and  Hans  and  Pete  threw  themselves 
upon  him,  pounding  the  breath  into  him  and  the 
water  out  of  him.  He  staggered  to  his  feet 
and  fell  down.  The  faint  sound  of  Thorn 
ton's  voice  came  to  them,  and  though  they 
could  not  make  out  the  words  of  it,  they  knew 


150          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

that  he  was  in  his  extremity.  His  master's 
voice  acted  on  Buck  like  an  electric  shock.  He 
sprang  to  his  feet  and  ran  up  the  bank  ahead 
of  the  men  to  the  point  of  his  previous  de 
parture. 

Again  the  rope  was  attached  and  he  was 
launched,  and  again  he  struck  out,  but  this  time 
straight  into  the  stream.  He  had  miscalculated 
once,  but  he  would  not  be  guilty  of  it  a  second 
time.  Hans  paid  out  the  rope,  permitting  no 
slack,  while  Pete  kept  it  clear  of  coils.  Buck 
held  on  till  he  was  on  a  line  straight  above 
Thornton;  then  he  turned,  and  with  the  speed 
of  an  express  train  headed  down  upon  him. 
Thornton  saw  him  coming,  and,  as  Buck  struck 
him  like  a  battering  ram,  with  the  whole  force 
of  the  current  behind  him,  he  reached  up  and 
closed  with  both  arms  around  the  shaggy  neck. 
Hans  snubbed  the  rope  around  the  tree,  and 
Buck  and  Thornton  were  jerked  under  the 
water.  Strangling,  suffocating,  sometimes  one 
uppermost  and  sometimes  the  other,  dragging 
over  the  jagged  bottom,  smashing  against  rocks 
and  snags,  they  veered  into  the  bank. 


FOR  THE  LOVE  OF  A  MAN        151 

Thornton  came  to,  belly  downward  and 
being  violently  propelled  back  and  forth  across 
a  drift  log  by  Hans  and  Pete.  His  first  glance 
was  for  Buck,  over  whose  limp  and  apparently 
lifeless  body  Nig  was  setting  up  a  howl,  while 
Skeet  was  licking  the  wet  face  and  closed  eyes. 
Thornton  was  himself  bruised  and  battered, 
and  he  went  carefully  over  Buck's  body,  when 
he  had  been  brought  around,  finding  three 
broken  ribs. 

"  That  settles  it,"  he  announced.  "  We 
camp  right  here."  And  camp  they  did,  till 
Buck's  ribs  knitted  and  he  was  able  to  travel. 

That  winter,  at  Dawson,  Buck  performed 
another  exploit,  not  so  heroic,  perhaps,  but  one 
that  put  his  name  many  notches  higher  on  the 
totem-pole  of  Alaskan  fame.  This  exploit  was 
particularly  gratifying  to  the  three  men;  for 
they  stood  in  need  of  the  outfit  which  it  fur 
nished,  and  were  enabled  to  make  a  long- 
desired  trip  into  the  virgin  East,  where  miners 
had  not  yet  appeared.  It  was  brought  about 
by  a  conversation  in  the  Eldorado  Saloon,  in 
which  men  waxed  boastful  of  their  favorite 


152          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

dogs.  Buck,  because  of  his  record,  was  the 
target  for  these  men,  and  Thornton  was  driven 
stoutly  to  defend  him.  At  the  end  of  half  an 
hour  one  man  stated  that  his  dog  could  start 
a  sled  with  five  hundred  pounds  and  walk  off 
with  it;  a  second  bragged  six  hundred  for  his 
dog;  and  a  third,  seven  hundred. 

"  Pooh !  pooh ! "  said  John  Thornton, 
"  Buck  can  start  a  thousand  pounds. " 

44  And  break  it  out?  and  walk  off  with  it  for 
a  hundred  yards?"  demanded  Matthewson,  a 
Bonanza  King,  he  of  the  seven  hundred  vaunt. 

44  And  break  it  out,  and  walk  off  with  it  for 
a  hundred  yards,"  John  Thornton  said  coolly. 

44  Well,"  Matthewson  said,  slowly  and  de 
liberately,  so  that  all  could  hear,  4t  IVe  got  a 
thousand  dollars  that  says  he  can't.  And  there 
it  is."  So  saying,  he  slammed  a  sack  of  gold 
dust  of  the  size  of  a  bologna  sausage  down 
upon  the  bar. 

Nobody  spoke.  Thornton's  bluff,  if  bluff  it 
was,  had  been  called.  He  could  feel  a  flush 
of  warm  blood  creeping  up  his  face.  His 
tongue  had  tricked  him.  He  did  not  know 


FOR  THE  LOVE  OF  A  MAN         153 

whether  Buck  could  start  a  thousand  pounds. 
Half  a  ton !  The  enormousness  of  it  appalled 
him.  He  had  great  faith  in  Buck's  strength 
and  had  often  thought  him  capable  of  starting 
such  a  load;  but  never,  as  now,  had  he  faced 
the  possibility  of  it;  the  eyes  of  a  dozen  men 
fixed  upon  him,  silent  and  waiting.  Further, 
he  had  no  thousand  dollars;  nor  had  Hans  or 
Pete. 

11  I've  got  a  sled  standing  outside  now,  with 
twenty  fifty-pound  sacks  of  flour  on  it,"  Mat- 
thewson  went  on  with  brutal  directness,  "  so 
don't  let  that  hinder  you." 

Thornton  did  not  reply.  He  did  not  know 
what  to  say.  He  glanced  from  face  to  face 
in  the  absent  way  of  a  man  who  has  lost  the 
power  of  thought  and  is  seeking  somewhere  to 
find  the  thing  that  will  start  it  going  again. 
The  face  of  Jim  O'Brien,  a  Mastodon  King 
and  old-time  comrade,  caught  his  eyes.  It  was 
as  a  cue  to  him,  seeming  to  rouse  him  to  do 
what  he  would  never  have  dreamed  of  doing. 

"  Can  you  lend  me  a  thousand?  "  he  asked, 
almost  in  a  whisper. 


154         THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

"  Sure/'  answered  O'Brien,  thumping  down 
a  plethoric  sack  by  the  side  of  Matthewson's. 
"  Though  it's  little  faith  I'm  having,  John, 
that  the  beast  can  do  the  trick." 

The  Eldorado  emptied  its  occupants  into  the 
street  to  see  the  test.  The  tables  were  de 
serted,  and  the  dealers  and  gamekeepers  came 
forth  to  see  the  outcome  of  the  wager  and  to 
lay  odds.  Several  hundred  men,  furred  and 
mittened,  banked  around  the  sled  within  easy 
distance.  Matthewson's  sled,  loaded  with  a 
thousand  pounds  of  flour,  had  been  standing 
for  a  couple  of  hours,  and  in  the  intense  cold  (it 
was  sixty  below  zero)  the  runners  had  frozen 
fast  to  the  hard-packed  snow.  Men  offered 
odds  of  two  to  one  that  Buck  could  not  budge 
the  sled.  A  quibble  arose  concerning  the 
phrase  "  break  out."  O'Brien  contended  it 
was  Thornton's  privilege  to  knock  the  runners 
loose,  leaving  Buck  to  "  break  it  out  "  from 
a  dead  standstill.  Matthewson  insisted  that 
the  phrase  included  breaking  the  runners  from 
the  frozen  grip  of  the  snow.  A  majority  of  the 
men  who  had  witnessed  the  making  of  the  bet 


FOR  THE  LOVE  OF  A  MAN         155 

decided  in  his  favor,  whereat  the  odds  went  up 
to  three  to  one  against  Buck. 

There  were  no  takers.  Not  a  man  believed 
him  capable  of  the  feat.  Thornton  had  been 
hurried  into  the  wager,  heavy  with  doubt;  and 
now  that  he  looked  at  the  sled  itself,  the  con 
crete  fact,  with  the  regular  team  of  ten  dogs 
curled  up  in  the  snow  before  it,  the  more 
impossible  the  task  appeared.  Matthewson 
waxed  jubilant. 

"  Three  to  one !  "  he  proclaimed.  "  I'll  lay 
you  another  thousand  at  that  figure,  Thornton. 
What  d'ye  say  ?" 

Thornton's  doubt  was  strong  in  his  face,  but 
his  fighting  spirit  was  aroused  —  the  fighting 
spirit  that  soars  above  odds,  fails  to  recognize 
the  impossible,  and  is  deaf  to  all  save  the 
clamor  for  battle.  He  called  Hans  and  Pete 
to  him.  Their  sacks  were  slim,  and  with  his 
own  the  three  partners  could  rake  together  only 
two  hundred  dollars.  In  the  ebb  of  their  for 
tunes,  this  sum  was  their  total  capital;  yet  they 
laid  it  unhesitatingly  against  Matthewson's  six 
hundred. 


156          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

The  team  of  ten  dogs  was  unhitched,  and 
Buck,  with  his  own  harness,  was  put  into  the 
sled.  He  had  caught  the  contagion  of  the  ex 
citement,  and  he  felt  that  in  some  way  he  must 
do  a  great  thing  for  John  Thornton.  Mur 
murs  of  admiration  at  his  splendid  appearance 
went  up.  He  was  in  perfect  condition,  without 
an  ounce  of  superfluous  flesh,  and  the  one  hun 
dred  and  fifty  pounds  that  he  weighed  were  so 
many  pounds  of  grit  and  virility.  His  furry 
coat  shone  with  the  sheen  of  silk.  Down  the 
neck  and  across  the  shoulders,  his  mane,  in 
repose  as  it  was,  half  bristled  and  seemed  to  lift 
with  every  movement  as  though  excess  of  vigor 
made  each  particular  hair  alive  and  active. 
The  great  breast  and  heavy  fore  legs  were  no 
,  more  than  in  proportion  with  the  rest  of  the 
body,  where  the  muscles  showed  in  tight  rolls 
underneath  the  skin.  Men  felt  these  muscles 
and  proclaimed  them  hard  as  iron,  and  the  odds 
went  down  to  two  to  one. 

"  Gad,  sir!  Gad,  sir!  "  stuttered  a  member 
of  the  latest  dynasty,  a  king  of  the  Skookum 
Benches.  "  I  offer  you  eight  hundred  for  him, 


FOR  THE  LOVE  OF  A  MAN        157 

sir,  before  the  test,  sir;  eight  hundred  just  as 
he  stands." 

Thornton  shook  his  head  and  stepped  to 
Buck's  side. 

"  You  must  stand  off  from  him,"  Matthew- 
son  protested.  "  Free  play  and  plenty  of 


room." 


The  crowd  fell  silent;  only  could  be  heard 
the  voices  of  the  gamblers  vainly  offering  two 
to  one.  Everybody  acknowledged  Buck  a 
magnificent  animal,  but  twenty  fifty-pound  sacks 
of  flour  bulked  too  large  in  their  eyes  for  them 
to  loosen  their  pouch-strings. 

Thornton  knelt  down  by  Buck's  side.  He 
took  his  head  in  his  two  hands  and  rested  cheek 
on  cheek.  He  did  not  playfully  shake  him,  as 
was  his  wont,  or  murmur  soft  love  curses;  but 
he  whispered  in  his  ear.  "  As  you  love  me, 
Buck.  As  you  love  me,"  was  what  he  whis 
pered.  Buck  whined  with  suppressed  eager 
ness. 

The  crowd  was  watching  curiously.  The 
affair  was  growing  mysterious.  It  seemed  like 
a  conjuration.  As  Thornton  got  to  his  feet, 


158          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

Buck  seized  his  mittened  hand  between  his 
jaws,  pressing  in  with  his  teeth  and  releasing 
slowly,  half-reluctantly.  It  was  the  answer,  in 
terms,  not  of  speech,  but  of  love.  Thornton 
stepped  well  back. 

"  Now,  Buck,"  he  said. 

Buck  tightened  the  traces,  then  slacked  them 
for  a  matter  of  several  inches.  It  was  the  way 
he  had  learned. 

"Gee!"  Thornton's  voice  rang  out,  sharp 
in  the  tense  silence. 

Buck  swung  to  the  right,  ending  the  move 
ment  in  a  plunge  that  took  up  the  slack  and 
with  a  sudden  jerk  arrested  his  one  hundred 
and  fifty  pounds.  The  load  quivered,  and 
from  under  the  runners  arose  a  crisp  crackling. 

"Haw!"  Thornton  commanded. 

Buck  duplicated  the  manoeuvre,  this  time  to 
the  left.  The  crackling  turned  into  a  snapping, 
the  sled  pivoting  and  the  runners  slipping  and 
grating  several  inches  to  the  side.  The  sled 
was  broken  out.  Men  were  holding  their 
breaths,  intensely  unconscious  of  the  fact. 

"  Now,  MUSH !  " 


FOR  THE  LOVE  OF  A  MAN         159 

Thornton's  command  cracked  out  like  a 
pistol-shot.  Buck  threw  himself  forward, 
tightening  the  traces  with  a  jarring  lunge. 
His  whole  body  was  gathered  compactly  to 
gether  in  the  tremendous  effort,  the  muscles 
writhing  and  knotting  like  live  things  under 
the  silky  fur.  His  great  chest  was  low  to  the 
ground,  his  head  forward  and  down,  while  his 
feet  were  flying  like  mad,  the  claws  scarring 
the  hard-packed  snow  in  parallel  grooves. 
The  sled  swayed  and  trembled,  half-started 
forward.  One  of  his  feet  slipped,  and  one  man 
groaned  aloud.  Then  the  sled  lurched  ahead 
in  what  appeared  a  rapid  succession  of  jerks, 
though  it  never  really  came  to  a  dead  stop 
again  .  .  .  half  an  inch  ...  an  inch  .  .  . 
two  inches.  .  .  .  The  jerks  perceptibly  dimin 
ished;  as  the  sled  gained  momentum,  he  caught 
them  up,  till  it  was  moving  steadily  along. 

Men  gasped  and  began  to  breathe  again, 
unaware  that  for  a  moment  they  had  ceased  to 
breathe.  Thornton  was  running  behind,  en 
couraging  Buck  with  short,  cheery  words. 
The  distance  had  been  measured  off,  and  as  he 


160          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

neared  the  pile  of  firewood  which  marked  the 
end  of  the  hundred  yards,  a  cheer  began  to 
grow  and  grow,  which  burst  into  a  roar  as  he 
passed  the  firewood  and  halted  at  command. 
Every  man  was  tearing  himself  loose,  even 
Matthewson.  Hats  and  mittens  were  flying  in 
the  air.  Men  were  shaking  hands,  it  did  not 
matter  with  whom,  and  bubbling  over  in  a  gen 
eral  incoherent  babel. 

But  Thornton  fell  on  his  knees  beside  Buck. 
Head  was  against  head,  and  he  was  shaking 
him  back  and  forth.  Those  who  hurried  up 
heard  him  cursing  Buck,  and  he  cursed  him 
long  and  fervently,  and  softly  and  lovingly. 

"Gad,  sir!  Gad,  sir!"  spluttered  the 
Skookum  Bench  king.  "I'll  give  you  a 
thousand  for  him,  sir,  a  thousand,  sir  —  twelve 
hundred,  sir." 

Thornton  rose  to  his  feet.  His  eyes  were 
wet.  The  tears  were  streaming  frankly  down 
his  cheeks.  u  Sir,"  he  said  to  the  Skookum 
Bench  king,  "  no,  sir.  You  can  go  to  hell,  sir. 
It's  the  best  I  can  do  for  you,  sir." 

Buck  seized  Thornton's  hand  in  his  teeth. 


FOR  THE  LOVE  OF  A  MAN         161 

Thornton  shook  him  back  and  forth.  As 
though  animated  by  a  common  impulse,  the  on 
lookers  drew  back  to  a  respectful  distance,  nor 
were  they  again  indiscreet  enough  to  interrupt. 


VII 
THE  SOUNDING  OF  THE  CALL 


VII 
The  Sounding  of  the  Call 

WHEN  Buck  earned  sixteen  hundred 
dollars  in  five  minutes  for  John 
Thornton,  he  made  it  possible  for 
his  master  to  pay  off  certain  debts  and  to 
journey  with  his  partners  into  the  East  after  a 
fabled  lost  mine,  the  history  of  which  was  as 
old  as  the  history  of  the  country.  Many  men 
had  sought  it;  few  had  found  it;  and  more 
than  a  few  there  were  who  had  never  returned 
from  the  quest.  This  lost  mine  was  steeped 
in  tragedy  and  shrouded  in  mystery.  No  one 
knew  of  the  first  man.  The  oldest  tradition 
stopped  before  it  got  back  to  him.  From  the 
beginning  there  had  been  an  ancient  and  ram 
shackle  cabin.  Dying  men  had  sworn  to  it,  and 
to  the  mine  the  site  of  which  it  marked,  clinching 
their  testimony  with  nuggets  that  were  unlike 
any  known  grade  of  gold  in  the  Northland. 

165 


1 66          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

But  no  living  man  had  looted  this  treasure 
house,  and  the  dead  were  dead;  wherefore 
John  Thornton  and  Pete  and  Hans,  with 
Buck  and  half  a  dozen  other  dogs,  faced  into 
the  East  on  an  unknown  trail  to  achieve  where 
men  and  dogs  as  good  as  themselves  had 
failed.  They  sledded  seventy  miles  up  the 
Yukon,  swung  to  the  left  into  the  Stewart 
River,  passed  the  Mayo  and  the  McQuestion, 
and  held  on  until  the  Stewart  itself  became  a 
streamlet,  threading  the  upstanding  peaks  which 
marked  the  backbone  of  the  continent. 

John  Thornton  asked  little  of  man  or  nature. 
He  was  unafraid  of  the  wild.  With  a  handful 
of  salt  and  a  rifle  he  could  plungs  into  the 
wilderness  and  fare  wherever  he  pleased  and 
as  long  as  he  pleased.  Being  in  no  haste,  In 
dian  fashion,  he  hunted  his  dinner  in  the  course 
of  the  day's  travel;  and  if  he  failed  to  find  it, 
like  the  Indian,  he  kept  on  travelling,  secure  in 
the  knowledge  that  sooner  or  later  he  would 
come  to  it.  So,  on  this  great  journey  into  the 
East,  straight  meat  was  the  bill  of  fare,  am 
munition  and  tools  principally  made  up  the  load 


THE  SOUNDING  OF  THE  CALL     167 

on  the  sled,  and  the  time-card  was  drawn  upon 
the  limitless  future. 

To  Buck  it  was  boundless  delight,  this  hunt 
ing,  fishing,  and  indefinite  wandering  through 
strange  places.  For  weeks  at  a  time  they 
would  hold  steadily,  day  after  day,  and  for 
weeks  upon  end  they  would  camp  here  and 
there,  the  dogs  loafing  and  the  men  burning 
holes  through  frozen  muck  and  gravel  and 
washing  countless  pans  of  dirt  by  the  heat  of 
the  fire.  Sometimes  they  went  hungry,  some 
times  they  feasted  riotously,  all  according  to  the 
abundance  of  game  and  the  fortune  of  hunting. 
Summer  arrived,  and  dogs  and  men  packed  on 
their  backs,  rafted  across  blue  mountain  lakes, 
and  descended  or  ascended  unknown  rivers  in 
slender  boats  whipsawed  from  the  standing 
forest. 

The  months  came  and  went,  and  back  and 
forth  they  twisted  through  the  uncharted  vast- 
ness,  where  no  men  were  and  yet  where  men 
had  been  if  the  Lost  Cabin  were  true.  They 
went  across  divides  in  summer  blizzards,  shiv 
ered  under  the  midnight  sun  on  naked  moun- 


1 68         THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

tains  between  the  timber  line  and  the  eternal 
snows,  dropped  into  summer  valleys  amid 
swarming  gnats  and  flies,  and  in  the  shadows 
of  glaciers  picked  strawberries  and  flowers  as 
ripe  and  fair  as  any  the  Southland  could  boast. 
In  the  fall  of  the  year  they  penetrated  a  weird 
lake  country,  sad  and  silent,  where  wild-fowl 
had  been,  but  where  then  there  was  no  life 
nor  sign  of  life  —  only  the  blowing  of  chill 
winds,  the  forming  of  ice  in  sheltered  places, 
and  the  melancholy  rippling  of  waves  on  lonely 
beaches. 

And  through  another  winter  they  wandered 
on  the  obliterated  trails  of  men  who  had  gone 
before.  Once,  they  came  upon  a  path  blazed 
through  the  forest,  an  ancient  path,  and  the 
Lost  Cabin  seemed  very  near.  But  the  path 
began  nowhere  and  ended  nowhere,  and  it 
remained  mystery,  as  the  man  who  made  it 
and  the  reason  he  made  it  remained  mystery. 
Another  time  they  chanced  upon  the  time- 
graven  wreckage  of  a  hunting  lodge,  and  amid 
the  shreds  of  rotted  blankets  John  Thornton 
found  a  long-barrelled  flint-lock.  He  knew  it 


THE  SOUNDING  OF  THE  CALL     169 

for  a  Hudson  Bay  Company  gun  of  the  young 
days  in  the  Northwest,  when  such  a  gun  was 
worth  its  height  in  beaver  skins  packed  flat. 
And  that  was  all  —  no  hint  as  to  the  men  who 
in  an  early  day  had  reared  the  lodge  and  left 
the  gun  among  the  blankets. 

Spring  came  on  once  more,  and  at  the  end 
of  all  their  wandering  they  found,  not  the  Lost 
Cabin,  but  a  shallow  placer  in  a  broad  valley 
where  the  gold  showed  like  yellow  butter  across 
the  bottom  of  the  washing-pan.  They  sought 
no  farther.  Each  day  they  worked  earned 
them  thousands  of  dollars  in  clean  dust  and 
nuggets,  and  they  worked  every  day.  The  gold 
was  sacked  in  moose-hide  bags,  fifty  pounds  to 
the  bag,  and  piled  like  so  much  firewood  out 
side  the  spruce-bough  lodge.  Like  giants  they 
toiled,  days  flashing  on  the  heels  of  days  like 
dreams  as  they  heaped  the  treasure  up. 

There  was  nothing  for  the  dogs  to  do,  save 
the  hauling  in  of  meat  now  and  again  that 
Thornton  killed,  and  Buck  spent  long  hours 
musing  by  the  fire.  The  vision  of  the  short- 
legged  hairy  man  came  to  him  more  frequently, 


1 7o          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

now  that  there  was  little  work  to  be  done;  and 
often,  blinking  by  the  fire,  Buck  wandered  with 
him  in  that  other  world  which  he  remembered. 
The  salient  thing  of  this  other  world  seemed 
fear.  When  he  watched  the  hairy  man  sleep 
ing  by  the  fire,  head  between  his  knees  and 
hands  clasped  above,  Buck  saw  that  he  slept 
restlessly,  with  many  starts  and  awakenings, 
at  which  times  he  would  peer  fearfully  into  the 
darkness  and  fling  more  wood  upon  the  fire. 
Did  they  walk  by  the  beach  of  a  sea,  where  the 
hairy  man  gathered  shell-fish  and  ate  them  as 
he  gathered,  it  was  with  eyes  that  roved  every 
where  for  hidden  danger  and  with  legs  pre 
pared  to  run  like  the  wind  at  its  first  appear 
ance.  Through  the  forest  they  crept  noise 
lessly,  Buck  at  the  hairy  man's  heels;  and  they 
were  alert  and  vigilant,  the  pair  of  them,  ears 
twitching  and  moving  and  nostrils  quivering, 
for  the  man  heard  and  smelled  as  keenly  as 
Buck.  The  hairy  man  could  spring  up  into  the 
trees  and  travel  ahead  as  fast  as  on  the  ground, 
swinging  by  the  arms  from  limb  to  limb,  some 
times  a  dozen  feet  apart,  letting  go  and  catch- 


THE  SOUNDING  OF  THE  CALL     171 

ing,  never  falling,  never  missing  his  grip.  In 
fact,  he  seemed  as  much  at  home  among  the 
trees  as  on  the  ground;  and  Buck  had  memories 
of  nights  of  vigil  spent  beneath  trees  wherein 
the  hairy  man  roosted,  holding  on  tightly  as  he 
slept. 

And  closely  akin  to  the  visions  of  the  hairy 
man  was  the  call  still  sounding  in  the  depths 
of  the  forest.  It  filled  him  with  a  great  unrest 
and  strange  desires.  It  caused  him  to  feel  a 
vague,  sweet  gladness,  and  he  was  aware  of 
wild  yearnings  and  stirrings  for  he  knew  not 
what.  Sometimes  he  pursued  the  call  into  the 
forest,  looking  for  it  as  though  it  were  a  tan 
gible  thing,  barking  softly  or  defiantly,  as  the 
mood  might  dictate.  He  would  thrust  his  nose 
into  the  cool  wood  moss,  or  into  the  black  soil 
where  long  grasses  grew,  and  snort  with  joy  at 
the  fat  earth  smells;  or  he  would  crouch  for 
hours,  as  if  in  concealment,  behind  fungus-cov 
ered  trunks  of  fallen  trees,  wide-eyed  and  wide- 
eared  to  all  that  moved  and  sounded  about  him. 
It  might  be,  lying  thus,  that  he  hoped  to  sur 
prise  this  call  he  could  not  understand.  But 


1 72          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

he  did  not  know  why  he  did  these  various 
things.  He  was  impelled  to  do  them,  and  did 
not  reason  about  them  at  all. 

Irresistible  impulses  seized  him.  He  would 
be  lying  in  camp,  dozing  lazily  in  the  heat  of 
the  day,  when  suddenly  his  head  would  lift  and 
his  ears  cock  up,  intent  and  listening,  and  he 
would  spring  to  his  feet  and  dash  away,  and  on 
and  on,  for  hours,  through  the  forest  aisles  and 
across  the  open  spaces  where  the  niggerheads 
bunched.  He  loved  to  run  down  dry  water 
courses,  and  to  creep  and  spy  upon  the  bird  life 
in  the  woods.  For  a  day  at  a  time  he  would 
lie  in  the  underbrush  where  he  could  watch  the 
partridges  drumming  and  strutting  up  and 
down.  But  especially  he  loved  to  run  in  the 
dim  twilight  of  the  summer  midnights,  listening 
to  the  subdued  and  sleepy  murmurs  of  the  for 
est,  reading  signs  and  sounds  as  man  may  read 
a  book,  and  seeking  for  the  mysterious  some 
thing  that  called  —  called,  waking  or  sleeping, 
at  all  times,  for  him  to  come. 

One  night  he  sprang  from  sleep  with  a  start, 
eager-eyed,  nostrils  quivering  and  scenting,  his 


THE  SOUNDING  OF  THE  CALL     173 

mane  bristling  in  recurrent  waves.  From  the 
forest  came  the  call  (or  one  note  of  it,  for  the 
call  was  many  noted),  distinct  and  definite  as 
never  before, —  a  long-drawn  howl,  like,  yet 
unlike,  any  noise  made  by  husky  dog.  And  he 
knew  it,  in  the  old  familiar  way,  as  a  sound 
heard  before.  He  sprang  through  the  sleeping 
camp  and  in  swift  silence  dashed  through  the 
woods.  As  he  drew  closer  to  the  cry  he  went 
more  slowly,  with  caution  in  every  movement, 
till  he  came  to  an  open  place  among  the  trees, 
and  looking  out  saw,  erect  on  haunches,  with 
nose  pointed  to  the  sky,  a  long,  lean,  timber 
wolf. 

He  had  made  no  noise,  yet  it  ceased  from 
its  howling  and  tried  to  sense  his  presence. 
Buck  stalked  into  the  open,  half  crouching, 
body  gathered  compactly  together,  tail  straight 
and  stiff,  feet  falling  with  unwonted  care. 
Every  movement  advertised  commingled  threat 
ening  and  overture  of  friendliness.  It  was  the 
menacing  truce  that  marks  the  meeting  of  wild 
beasts  that  prey.  But  the  wolf  fled  at  sight 
of  him.  He  followed,  with  wild  leapings,  in  a 


I74          THE  CALL' OF  THE  WILD 

frenzy  to  overtake.  He  ran  him  into  a  blind 
channel,  in  the  bed  of  the  creek,  where  a  tim 
ber  jam  barred  the  way.  The  wolf  whirled 
about,  pivoting  on  his  hind  legs  after  the  fash 
ion  of  Joe  and  of  all  cornered  husky  dogs, 
snarling  and  bristling,  clipping  his  teeth  to 
gether  in  a  continuous  and  rapid  succession 
of  snaps. 

Buck  did  not  attack,  but  circled  him  about 
and  hedged  him  in  with  friendly  advances. 
The  wolf  was  suspicious  and  afraid;  for  Buck 
made  three  of  him  in  weight,  while  his  head 
barely  reached  Buck's  shoulder.  Watching  his 
chance,  he  darted  away,  and  the  chase  was 
resumed.  Time  and  again  he  was  cornered, 
and  the  thing  repeated,  though  he  was  in  poor 
condition  or  Buck  could  not  so  easily  have 
overtaken  him.  He  would  run  till  Buck's 
head  was  even  with  his  flank,  when  he  would 
whirl  around  at  bay,  only  to  dash  away  again 
at  the  first  opportunity. 

But  in  the  end  Buck's  pertinacity  was  re 
warded;  for  the  wolf,  finding  that  no  harm  was 
intended,  finally  sniffed  noses  with  him.  Then 


THE  SOUNDING  OF  THE  CALL     175 

they  became  friendly,  and  played  about  in  the 
nervous,  half-coy  way  with  which  fierce  beasts 
belie  their  fierceness.  After  some  time  of  this 
the  wolf  started  off  at  an  easy  lope  in  a  manner 
that  plainly  showed  he  was  going  somewhere. 
He  made  it  clear  to  Buck  that  he  was  to  come, 
and  they  ran  side  by  side  through  the  sombre 
twilight,  straight  up  the  creek  bed,  into  the 
gorge  from  which  it  issued,  and  across  the  bleak 
divide  where  it  took  its  rise. 

On  the  opposite  slope  of  the  watershed  they 
came  down  into  a  level  country  where  were 
great  stretches  of  forest  and  many  streams, 
and  through  these  great  stretches  they  ran 
steadily,  hour  after  hour,  the  sun  rising  higher 
and  the  day  growing  warmer.  Buck  was 
wildly  glad.  He  knew  he  was  at  last  answer 
ing  the  call,  running  by  the  side'  of  his  wood 
brother  toward  the  place  from  where  the  call 
surely  came.  Old  memories  were  coming  upon 
him  fast,  and  he  was  stirring  to  them  as  of  old 
he  stirred  to  the  realities  of  which  they  were 
the  shadows.  He  had  done  this  thing  before, 
somewhere  in  that  other  and  dimly  remembered 


1 76          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

world,  and  he  was  doing  it  again,  now,  running 
free  in  the  open,  the  unpacked  earth  underfoot, 
the  wide  sky  overhead. 

They  stopped  by  a  running  stream  to  drink, 
and,  s  opping,  Buck  remembered  John  Thorn 
ton.  He  sat  down.  The  wolf  started  on 
toward  the  place  from  where  the  call  surely 
came,  then  returned  to  him,  sniffing  noses  and 
making  actions  as  though  to  encourage  him. 
But  Buck  turned  about  and  started  slowly  on 
the  back  track.  For  the  better  part  of  an 
hour  the  wild  brother  ran  by  his  side,  whining 
softly.  Then  he  sat  down,  pointed  his  nose 
upward,  and  howled.  It  was  a  mournful  howl, 
and  as  Buck  held  steadily  on  his  way  he  heard 
it  grow  faint  and  fainter  until  it  was  lost  in  the 
distance. 

John  Thornton  was  eating  dinner  when  Buck 
dashed  into  camp  and  sprang  upon  him  in  a 
frenzy  of  affection,  overturning  him,  scrambling 
upon  him,  licking  his  face,  biting  his  hand  — 
44  playing  the  general  torn-fool,"  as  John  Thorn 
ton  characterized  it,  the  while  he  shook  Buck 
back  and  forth  and  cursed  him  lovingly. 


THE  SOUNDING  OF  THE  CALL     177 

For  two  days  and  nights  Buck  never  left 
camp,  never  let  Thornton  out  of  his  sight, 
lie  followed  him  about  at  his  work,  watched 
him  while  he  ate,  saw  him  into  his  blankets  at 
night  and  out  of  them  in  the  morning.  But 
after  two  days  the  call  in  the  forest  began  to 
sound  more  imperiously  than  ever.  Buck's 
restlessness  came  back  on  him,  and  he  was 
haunted  by  recollections  of  the  wild  brother, 
and  of  the  smiling  land  beyond  the  divide  and 
the  run  side  by  side  through  the  wide  forest 
stretches.  Once  again  he  took  to  wandering 
in  the  woods,  but  the  wild  brother  came  no 
more;  and  though  he  listened  through  long 
vigils,  the  mournful  howl  was  never  raised. 

We  began  to  sleep  out  at  night,  staying 
away  from  camp  for  days  at  a  time;  and  once 
he  crossed  the  divide  at  the  head  of  the  creek 
and  went  down  into  the  land  of  timber  and 
streams.  There  he  wandered  for  a  week, 
seeking  vainly  for  fresh  sign  of  the  wild 
brother,  killing  his  meat  as  he  travelled  and 
travelling  with  the  long,  easy  lope  that  seems 
never  to  tire.  He  fished  for  salmon  in  a  broad 


I78    THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

stream  that  empties  somewhere  into  the  seas 
and  by  this  stream  he  killed  a  large  black  bear, 
blinded  by  the  mosquitoes  while  likewise  fishing, 
and  raging  through  the  forest  helpless  and 
terrible.  Even  so,  it  was  a  hard  fight,  and 
it  aroused  the  last  latent  remnants  of  Buck's 
ferocity.  And  two  days  later,  when  he  re 
turned  to  his  kill  and  found  a  dozen  wolver 
enes  quarrelling  over  the  spoil,  he  scattered 
them  like  chaff;  and  those  that  fled  left  two 
behind  who  would  quarrel  no  more. 

The  blood-longing  became  stronger  than 
ever  before.  He  was  a  killer,  a  thing  that 
preyed,  living  on  the  things  that  lived,  unaided, 
alone,  by  virtue  of  his  own  strength  and 
prowess,  surviving  triumphantly  in  a  hostile 
environment  where  only  the  strong  survived. 
Because  of  all  this  he  became  possessed  of  a 
great  pride  in  himself,  which  communicated 
itself  like  a  contagion  to  his  physical  being. 
It  advertised  itself  in  all  his  movements,  was 
apparent  in  the  play  of  every  muscle,  spoke 
plainly  as  speech  in  the  way  he  carried  himself, 
and  made  his  glorious  furry  coat  if  anything 


THE  SOUNDING  OF  THE  CALL     179 

more  glorious.  But  for  the  stray  brown  on  his 
muzzle  and  above  his  eyes,  and  for  the  splash 
of  white  hair  that  ran  midmost  down  his  chest, 
he  might  well  have  been  mistaken  for  a  gigantic 
wolf,  larger  than  the  largest  of  the  breed. 
From  his  St.  Bernard  father  he  had  inherited 
size  and  weight,  but  it  was  his  shepherd 
mother  who  had  given  shape  to  that  size  and 
weight.  His  muzzle  was  the  long  wolf  muzzle, 
save  that  it  was  larger  than  the  muzzle  of  any 
wolf;  and  his  head,  somewhat  broader,  was 
the  wolf  head  on  a  massive  scale. 

His  cunning  was  wolf  cunning,  and  wild 
cunning;  his  intelligence,  shepherd  intelligence 
and  St.  Bernard  intelligence;  and  all  this,  plus 
an  experience  gained  in  the  fiercest  of  schools, 
made  him  as  formidable  a  creature  as  any  that 
roamed  the  wild.  A  carnivorous  animal,  liv 
ing  on  a  straight  meat  diet,  he  was  in  full 
flower,  at  the  high  tide  of  his  life,  overspilling 
with  vigor  and  virility.  When  Thornton 
passed  a  caressing  hand  along  his  back,  a  snap 
ping  and  crackling  followed  the  hand,  each  hair 
discharging  its  pent  magnetism  at  the  contact 


l8o          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

Every  part,  brain  and  body,  nerve  tissue  and 
fibre,  was  keyed  to  the  most  exquisite  pitch;  and 
between  all  the  parts  there  was  a  perfect  equi 
librium  or  adjustment.  To  sights  and  sounds 
and  events  which  required  action,  he  responded 
with  lightning-like  rapidity.  Quickly  as  a 
husky  dog  could  leap  to  defend  from  attack  or 
to  attack,  he  could  leap  twice  as  quickly.  He 
saw  the  movement,  or  heard  sound,  and  re 
sponded  in  less  time  than  another  dog  required 
to  compass  the  mere  seeing  or  hearing.  He 
perceived  and  determined  and  responded  in  the 
same  instant.  In  point  of  fact  the  three  actions 
of  perceiving,  determining,  and  responding 
were  sequential;  but  so  infinitesimal  were  the 
intervals  of  time  between  them  that  they  ap 
peared  simultaneous.  His  muscles  were  sur 
charged  with  vitality,  and  snapped  into  play 
sharply,  like  steel  springs.  Life  streamed 
through  him  in  splendid  flood,  glad  and  ram 
pant,  until  it  seemed  that  it  would  burst  him 
asunder  in  sheer  ecstasy  and  pour  forth  gener 
ously  over  the  world. 

"  Never  was  there  such  a  dog,"  said  John 


THE  SOUNDING  OF  THE  CALL     181 

Thornton  one  day,  as  the  partners  watched 
Buck  marching  out  of  camp. 

'  When  he  was  made,  the  mould  was  broke/' 
said  Pete. 

"  Py  jingo!  I  t'ink  so  mineself,"  Hans 
affirmed. 

They  saw  him  marching  out  of  camp,  but 
they  did  not  see  the  instant  and  terrible  trans 
formation  which  took  place  as  soon  as  he  was 
within  the  secrecy  of  the  forest.  He  no  longer 
marched.  At  once  he  became  a  thing  of  the 
wild,  stealing  along  softly,  cat-footed,  a  pass 
ing  shadow  that  appeared  and  disappeared 
among  the  shadows.  He  knew  how  to  take 
advantage  of  every  cover,  to  crawl  on  his 
belly  like  a  snake,  and  like  a  snake  to  leap  and 
strike.  He  could  take  a  ptarmigan  from  its 
nest,  kill  a  rabbit  as  it  slept,  and  snap  in  mid 
air  the  little  chipmunks  fleeing  a  second  too 
late  for  the  trees.  Fish,  in  open  pools,  were 
not  too  quick  for  him;  nor  were  beaver,  mend 
ing  their  dams,  too  wary.  He  killed  to  eat, 
not  from  wantonness;  but  he  preferred  to  eat 
what  he  killed  himself.  So  a  lurking  humor 


1 82         THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

ran  through  his  deeds,  and  it  was  his  delight 
to  steal  upon  the  squirrels,  and,  when  he  all 
but  had  them,  to  let  them  go,  chattering  in 
mortal  fear  to  the  tree-tops. 

As  the  fall  of  the  year  came  on,  the  moose 
appeared  in  greater  abundance,  moving  slowly 
down  to  meet  the  winter  in  the  lower  and  less 
rigorous  valleys.  Buck  had  already  dragged 
down  a  stray  part-grown  calf;  but  he  wished 
strongly  for  larger  and  more  formidable  quarry, 
and  he  came  upon  it  one  day  on  the  divide 
at  the  head  of  the  creek.  A  band  of  twenty 
moose  had  crossed  over  from  the  land  of 
streams  and  timber,  and  chief  among  them  was 
a  great  bull.  He  was  in  a  savage  temper,  and, 
standing  over  six  feet  from  the  ground,  was  as 
formidable  an  antagonist  as  even  Buck  could 
desire.  Back  and  forth  the  bull  tossed  his 
great  palmated  antlers,  branching  to  fourteen 
points  and  embracing  seven  feet  within  the  tips. 
His  small  eyes  burned  with  a  vicious  and  bitter 
light,  while  he  roared  with  fury  at  sight  of 
Buck. 

From  the  bull's  side,  just  forward  of  the 


THE  SOUNDING  OF  THE  CALL     183 

flank,  protruded  a  feathered  arrow-end,  which 
accounted  for  his  savageness.  Guided  by  that 
instinct  which  came  from  the  old  hunting  days 
of  the  primordial  world,  Buck  proceeded  to 
cut  the  bull  out  from  the  herd.  It  was  no  slight 
task.  He  would  bark  and  dance  about  in 
front  of  the  bull,  just  out  of  reach  of  the  great 
antlers  and  the  terrible  splay  hoofs  which  could 
have  stamped  his  life  out  with  a  single  blow. 
Unable  to  turn  his  back  on  the  fanged  danger 
and  go  on,  the  bull  would  be  driven  into  parox 
ysms  of  rage.  At  such  moments  he  charged 
Buck,  who  retreated  craftily,  luring  him  on  by 
a  simulated  inability  to  escape.  But  when  he 
was  thus  separated  from  his  fellows,  two  or 
three  of  the  younger  bulls  would  charge  back 
upon  Buck  and  enable  the  wounded  bull  to 
rejoin  the  herd. 

There  is  a  patience  of  the  wild  —  dogged, 
tireless,  persistent  as  life  itself  —  that  holds 
motionless  for  endless  hours  the  spider  in  its 
web,  the  snake  in  its  coils,  the  panther  in  its 
ambuscade;  this  patience  belongs  peculiarly  to 
life  when  it  hunts  its  living  food;  and  it  belonged 


184         THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

to  Buck  as  he  clnng  to  the  flank  of  the  herds 
retarding  its  march,  irritating  the  young  bulls, 
worrying  the  cows  with  their  half-grown  calves, 
and  driving  the  wounded  bull  mad  with  helpless 
rage.  For  half  a  day  this  continued.  Buck 
multiplied  himself,  attacking  from  all  sides,  en 
veloping  the  herd  in  a  whirlwind  of  menace, 
cutting  out  his  victim  as  fast  as  it  could  rejoin 
its  mates,  wearing  out  the  patience  of  creatures 
preyed  upon,  which  is  a  lesser  patience  than 
that  of  creatures  preying. 

As  the  day  wore  along  and  the  sun  dropped 
to  its  bed  in  the  northwest  (the  darkness  had 
come  back  and  the  fall  nights  were  six  hours 
long),  the  young  bulls  retraced  their  steps  more 
and  more  reluctantly  to  the  aid  of  their  beset 
leader.  The  down-coming  winter  was  harry 
ing  them  on  to  the  lower  levels,  and  it  seemed 
they  could  never  shake  off  this  tireless  creature 
that  held  them  back.  Besides,  it  was  not  the 
life  of  the  herd,  or  of  the  young  bulls,  that 
was  threatened.  The  life  of  only  one  member 
was  demanded,  which  was  a  remoter  interest 


THE  SOUNDING  OF  THE  CALL     185 

than  their  lives,  and  in  the  end  they  were  con 
tent  to  pay  the  toll. 

As  twilight  fell  the  old  bull  stood  with  low 
ered  head,  watching  his  mates  —  the  cows  he 
had  known,  the  calves  he  had  fathered,  the  bulls 
he  had  mastered  —  as  they  shambled  on  at  a 
rapid  pace  through  the  fading  light.  He  could 
not  follow,  for  before  his  nose  leaped  the 
merciless  fanged  terror  that  would  not  let  him 
go.  Three  hundredweight  more  than  half  a 
ton  he  weighed;  he  had  lived  a  long,  strong 
life,  full  of  fight  and  struggle,  and  at  the  end 
he  faced  death  at  the  teeth  of  a  creature  whose 
head  did  not  reach  beyond  his  great  knuckled 
knees. 

From  then  on,  night  and  day,  Buck  never 
left  his  prey,  never  gave  it  a  moment's  rest, 
never  permitted  it  to  browse  the  leaves  of  trees 
or  the  shoots  of  young  birch  and  willow.  Nor 
did  he  give  the  wounded  bull  opportunity  to 
slake  his  burning  thirst  in  the  slender  trickling 
streams  they  crossed.  Often,  in  desperation, 
he  burst  into  long  stretches  of  flight.  At  such 


1 86         THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

times  Buck  did  not  attempt  to  stay  him,  but 
loped  easily  at  his  heels,  satisfied  with  the  way 
the  game  was  played,  lying  down  when  the 
moose  stood  still,  attacking  him  fiercely  when 
he  strove  to  eat  or  drink. 

The  great  head  drooped  more  and  more 
under  its  tree  of  horns,  and  the  shambling  trot 
grew  weaker  and  weaker.  He  took  to  stand 
ing  for  long  periods,  with  nose  to  the  ground 
and  dejected  ears  dropped  limply;  and  Buck 
found  more  time  in  which  to  get  water  for 
himself  and  in  which  to  rest.  At  such  mo 
ments,  panting  with  red  lolling  tongue  and  with 
eyes  fixed  upon  the  big  bull,  it  appeared  to 
Buck  that  a  change  was  coming  over  the  face  of 
things.  He  could  feel  a  new  stir  in  the  land. 
As  the  moose  were  coming  into  the  land,  other 
kinds  of  life  were  coming  in.  Forest  and 
stream  and  air  seemed  palpitant  with  their 
presence.  The  news  of  it  was  borne  in  upon 
him,  not  by  sight,  or  sound,  or  smell,  but  by 
some  other  and  subtler  sense.  He  heard  noth 
ing,  saw  nothing,  yet  knew  that  the  land  was 
somehow  different;  that  through  it  strange 


THE  SOUNDING  OF  THE  CALL     187 

things  were  afoot  and  ranging;  and  he  resolved 
to  investigate  after  he  had  finished  the  business 
in  hand. 

At  last,  at  the  end  of  the  fourth  day,  he 
pulled  the  great  moose  down.  For  a  day  and 
a  night  he  remained  by  the  kill,  eating  and 
sleeping,  turn  and  turn  about.  Then,  rested, 
refreshed  and  strong,  he  turned  his  face  toward 
camp  and  John  Thornton.  He  broke  into  the 
long  easy  lope,  and  went  on,  hour  after  hour, 
never  at  loss  for  the  tangled  way,  heading 
straight  home  through  strange  country  with  a 
certitude  of  direction  that  put  man  and  his  mag 
netic  needle  to  shame. 

As  he  held  on  he  became  more  and  more 
conscious  of  the  new  stir  in  the  land.  There 
was  life  abroad  in  it  different  from  the  life 
which  had  been  there  throughout  the  summer. 
No  longer  was  this  fact  borne  in  upon  him  in 
some  subtle,  mysterious  way.  The  birds  talked 
of  it,  the  squirrels  chattered  about  it,  the  very 
breeze  whispered  of  it.  Several  times  he 
stopped  and  drew  in  the  fresh  morning  air  in 
great  sniffs,  reading  a  message  which  made  him 


1 88          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

leap  on  with  greater  speed.  He  was  oppressed 
with  a  sense  of  calamity  happening,  if  it  were 
not  calamity  already  happened;  and  as  he 
crossed  the  last  watershed  and  dropped  down 
into  the  valley  toward  camp,  he  proceeded  with 
greater  caution. 

Three  miles  away  he  came  upon  a  fresh  trail 
that  sent  his  neck  hair  rippling  and  bristling. 
It  led  straight  toward  camp  and  John  Thorn 
ton.  Buck  hurried  on,  swiftly  and  stealthily, 
every  nerve  straining  and  tense,  alert  to  the 
multitudinous  details  which  told  a  story — all 
but  the  end.  His  nose  gave  him  a  varying  de 
scription  of  the  passage  of  the  life  on  the  heels 
of  which  he  was  travelling.  He  remarked  the 
pregnant  silence  of  the  forest.  The  bird  life 
had  flitted.  The  squirrels  were  in  hiding. 
One  only  he  saw, —  a  sleek  gray  fellow,  flat 
tened  against  a  gray  dead  limb  so  that  he 
seemed  a  part  of  it,  a  woody  excrescence  upon 
the  wood  itself. 

As  Buck  slid  along  with  the  obscureness  of 
a  gliding  shadow,  Jiis  nose  was  jerked  suddenly 
to  the  side  as  though  a  positive  force  had 


THE  SOUNDING  OF  THE  CALL     189 

gripped  and  pulled  it.  He  followed  the  new 
scent  into  a  thicket  and  found  Nig.  He  was 
lying  on  his  side,  dead  where  he  had  dragged 
himself,  an  arrow  protruding,  head  and  feath 
ers,  from  either  side  of  his  body. 

A  hundred  yards  farther  on,  Buck  came  upon 
one  of  the  sled-dogs  Thornton  had  bought  in 
Dawson.  This  dog  was  thrashing  about  in  a 
death-struggle,  directly  on  the  trail,  and  Buck 
passed  around  him  without  stopping.  From 
the  camp  came  the  faint  sound  of  many  voices, 
rising  and  falling  in  a  sing-song  chant.  Belly 
ing  forward  to  the  edge  of  the  clearing  he 
found  Hans,  lying  on  his  face,  feathered  with 
arrows  like  a  porcupine.  At  the  same  instant 
Buck  peered  out  where  the  spruce-bough  lodge 
had  been  and  saw  what  made  his  hair  leap 
straight  up  on  his  neck  and  shoulders.  A  gust 
of  overpowering  rage  swept  over  him.  He  did 
not  know  that  he  growled,  but  he  growled  aloud 
with  a  terrible  ferocity.  For  the  last  time  in 
his  life  he  allowed  passion  to  usurp  cunning 
and  reason,  and  it  was  because  of  his  great  love 
for  John  Thornton  that  he  lost  his  head. 


I9o          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

The  Ycchats  were  dancing  about  the  wreck 
age  of  the  spruce-bough  lodge  when  they  heard 
a  fearful  roaring  and  saw  rushing  upon  them 
an  animal  the  like  of  which  they  had  never  seen 
before.  It  was  Buck,  a  live  hurricane  of  fury, 
hurling  himself  upon  them  in  a  frenzy  to  de 
stroy.  He  sprang  at  the  foremost  man  (it  was 
the  chief  of  the  Yeehats),  ripping  the  throat 
wide  open  till  the  rent  jugular  spouted  a  foun 
tain  of  blood.  He  did  not  pause  to  worry  the 
victim,  but  ripped  in  passing,  with  the  next 
bound  tearing  wide  the  throat  of  a  second  man. 
[There  was  no  withstanding  him.  He  plunged 
about  in  their  very  midst,  tearing,  rending,  de 
stroying,  in  constant  and  terrific  motion  which 
defied  the  arrows  they  discharged  at  him.  In 
fact,  so  inconceivably  rapid  were  his  move 
ments,  and  so  closely  were  the  Indians  tangled 
together,  that  they  shot  one  another  with  the 
arrows;  and  one  young  hunter,  hurling  a  spear 
at  Buck  in  mid  air,  drove  it  through  the  chest 
of  another  hunter  with  such  force  that  the  point 
broke  through  the  skin  of  the  back  and  stood 
out  beyond.  Then  a  panic  seized  the  Yeehats, 


THE  SOUNDING  OF  THE  CALL     191 

and  they  fled  in  terror  to  the  woods,  proclaim 
ing  as  they  fled  the  advent  of  the  Evil  Spirit, 

And  truly  Buck  was  the  Fiend  incarnate, 
raging  at  their  heels  and  dragging  them  down 
like  deer  as  they  raced  through  the  trees.  It 
was  a  fateful  day  for  the  Yeehats.  They  scat 
tered  far  and  wide  over  the  country,  and  it  was 
not  till  a  week  later  that  the  last  of  the  survivors 
gathered  together  in  a  lower  valley  and  counted 
their  losses.  As  for  Buck,  wearying  of  the 
pursuit,  he  returned  to  the  desolated  camp. 
He  found  Pete  where  he  had  been  killed  in 
his  blankets  in  the  first  moment  of  surprise. 
Thornton's  desperate  struggle  was  fresh- 
written  on  the  earth,  and  Buck  scented  every 
detail  of  it  down  to  the  edge  of  a  deep  pool. 
By  the  edge,  head  and  fore  feet  in  the  water, 
lay  Skeet,  faithful  to  the  last.  The  pool  itself, 
muddy  and  discolored  from  the  sluice  boxes, 
effectually  hid  what  it  contained,  and  it  con 
tained  John  T^hornton;  for  Buck  followed  his 
trace  into  the  water,  from  which  no  trace  led 
away. 

All  day  Buck  brooded  by  the  pool  or  roamed 


I92          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

restlessly  about  the  camp.  Death,  as  a  cessa 
tion  of  movement,  as  a  passing  out  and  away 
from  the  lives  of  the  living,  he  knew,  and  he 
knew  John  Thornton  was  dead.  It  left  a  great 
void  in  him,  somewhat  akin  to  hunger,  but  a 
void  which  ached  and  ached,  and  which  food 
could  not  fill.  At  times,  when  he  paused  to 
contemplate  the  carcasses  of  the  Yeehats,  he 
forgot  the  pain  of  it;  and  at  such  times  he 
was  aware  of  a  great  pride  in  himself, —  a 
pride  greater  than  any  he  had  yet  experienced. 
He  had  killed  man,  the  noblest  game  of  all,  and 
he  had  killed  in  the  face  of  the  law  of  club  and 
fang.  He  sniffed  the  bodies  curiously.  They 
had  died  so  easily.  It  was  harder  to  kill  a 
husky  dog  than  them.  They  were  no  match  at 
all,  were  it  not  for  their  arrows  and  spears  and 
clubs.  Thenceforward  he  would  be  unafraid 
of  them  except  when  they  bore  in  their  hands 
their  arrows,  spears,  and  clubs. 

Night  came  on,  and  a  full  moon  rose  high 
over  the  trees  into  the  sky,  lighting  the  land 
till  it  lay  bathed  in  ghostly  day.  And  with 
the  coming  of  the  night,  brooding  and  mourn- 


THE  SOUNDING  OF  THE  CALL     193 

ing  by  the  pool,  Buck  became  alive  to  a  stirring 
of  the  new  life  in  the  forest  other  than  that 
which  the  Yeehats  had  made.  He  stood  up, 
listening  and  scenting.  From  far  away  drifted 
a  faint,  sharp  yelp,  followed  by  a  chorus  of 
similar  sharp  yelps.  As  the  moments  passed 
the  yelps  grew  closer  and  louder.  Again  Buck 
knew  JJhem  as  things  heard  in  that  other  world 
which  persisted  in  his  memory.  He  walked  to 
the  centre  of  the  open  space  and  listened.  It 
was  the  call,  the  many-noted  call,  sounding  more 
luringly  and  compelling  than  ever  before. 
And  as  never  before,  he  was  ready  to  obey. 
John  Thornton  was  dead.  The  last  tie  was 
broken.  Man  and  the  claims  of  man  no  longer 
bound  him. 

Hunting  their  living  meat,  as  the  Yeehats 
were  hunting  it,  on  the  flanks  of  the  migrating 
moose,  the  wolf  pack  had  at  last  crossed  over 
from  the  land  of  streams  and  timber  and  in 
vaded  Buck's  valley.  Into  the  clearing  where 
the  moonlight  streamed,  they  poured  in  a  silvery 
flood;  and  in  the  centre  of  the  clearing  stood 
Buck,  motionless  as  a  statue,  waiting  their 


I94         THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

coming.  They  were  awed,  so  still  and  large 
he  stood,  and  a  moment's  pause  fell,  till  the 
boldest  one  leaped  straight  for  him.  Like  a 
flash  Buck  struck,  breaking  the  neck.  Then  he 
stood,  without  movement,  as  before,  the 
stricken  wolf  rolling  in  agony  behind  him. 
Three  others  tried  it  in  sharp  succession;  and 
one  after  the  other  they  drew  back,  streaming 
blood  from  slashed  throats  or  shoulders. 

[This  was  sufficient  to  fling  the  whole  pack 
forward,  pell-mell,  crowded  together,  blocked 
and  confused  by  its  eagerness  to  pull  down  the 
prey.  Buck's  marvellous  quickness  and  agility 
stood  him  in  good  stead.  Pivoting  on  his  hind 
legs,  and  snapping  and  gashing,  he  was  every 
where  at  once,  presenting  a  front  which  was 
apparently  unbroken  so  swiftly  did  he  whirl 
and  guard  from  side  to  side.  But  to  prevent 
them  from  getting  behind  him,  he  was  forced 
back,  down  past  the  pool  and  into  the  creek  bed, 
till  he  brought  up  against  a  high  gravel  bank. 
He  worked  along  to  a  right  angle  in  the  bank 
which  the  men  had  made  in  the  course  of  min 
ing,  and  in  this  angle  he  came  to  bay,  protected 


THE  SOUNDING  OF  THE  CALL     195 

on  three  sides  and  with  nothing  to  do  but  face 
the  front. 

And  so  well  did  he  face  it,  that  at  the  end 
of  half  an  hour  the  wolves  drew  back  discom 
fited.  The  tongues  of  all  were  out  and  lolling, 
the  white  fangs  showing  cruelly  white  in  the 
moonlight.  Some  were  lying  down  with  heads 
raised  and  ears  pricked  forward;  others  stood 
on  their  feet,  watching  him;  and  still  others 
were  lapping  water  from  the  pool.  One  wolf, 
long  and  lean  and  gray,  advanced  cautiously,  in 
a  friendly  manner,  and  Buck  recognized  the 
wild  brother  with  whom  he  had  run  for  a  night 
and  a  day.  He  was  whining  softly,  and,  as 
Buck  whined,  they  touched  noses. 

Then  an  old  wolf,  gaunt  and  battle-scarred, 
came  forward.  Buck  writhed  his  lips  into  the 
preliminary  of  a  snarl,  but  sniffed  noses  with 
him.  Whereupon  the  old  wolf  sat  down, 
pointed  nose  at  the  moon,  and  broke  out  the 
long  wolf  howl!  The  others  sat  down  and 
howled.  And  now  the  call  came  to  Buck  in  un 
mistakable  accents.  He,  too,  sat  down  and 
howled.  This  over,  he  came  out  of  his  angle 


196          THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

and  the  pack  crowded  around  him,  sniffing  in 
half-friendly,  half-savage  manner.  The  lead 
ers  lifted  the  yelp  of  the  pack  and  sprang  away 
into  the  woods.  The  wolves  swung  in  behind, 
yelping  in  chorus.  And  Buck  ran  with  them, 
side  by  side  with  the  wild  brother,  yelping  as  he 
ran. 

And  here  may  well  end  the  story  of  Buck. 
The  years  were  not  many  when  the  Yeehats 
noted  a  change  in  the  breed  of  timber  wolves; 
for  some  were  seen  with  splashes  of  brown  on 
head  and  muzzle,  and  with  a  rift  of  white 
centering  down  the  chest.  But  more  remark 
able  than  this,  the  Yeehats  tell  of  a  Ghost  Dog 
that  runs  at  the  head  of  the  pack.  They  are 
afraid  of  this  Ghost  Dog,  for  it  has  cunning 
greater  than  they,  stealing  from  their  camps  in 
fierce  winters,  robbing  their  traps,  slaying  their 
dogs,  and  defying  their  bravest  hunters. 

Nay,  the  tale  grows  worse.  Hunters  there 
are  who  fail  to  return  to  the  camp,  and  hunters 
there  have  been  whom  their  tribesmen  found 
with  throats  slashed  cruelly  open  and  with  wolf 


THE  SOUNDING  OF  THE  CALL     197 

prints  about  them  in  the  snow  greater  than  the 
prints  of  any  wolf.  Each  fall,  when  the  Yee- 
hats  follow  the  movement  of  the  moose,  there 
is  a  certain  valley  which  they  never  enter. 
And  women  there  are  who  become  sad  when  the 
word  goes  over  the  fire  of  how  the  Evil  Spirit 
same  to  select  that  valley  for  an  abiding-place. 

In  the  summers  there  is  one  visitor,  however, 
to  that  valley,  of  which  the  Yeehats  do  not 
know.  It  is  a  great,  gloriously  coated  wolf, 
like,  and  yet  unlike,  all  other  wolves.  He 
crosses  alone  from  the  smiling  timber  land  and 
comes  down  into  an  open  space  among  the  trees. 
Here  a  yellow  stream  flows  from  rotted  moose- 
hide  sacks  and  sinks  into  the  ground,  with  long 
grasses  growing  through  it  and  vegetable  mould 
overrunning  it  and  hiding  its  yellow  from  the 
sun;  and  here  he  muses  for  a  time,  howling 
once,  long  and  mournfully,  ere  he  departs. 

But  he  is  not  always  alone.  When  the  long 
winter  nights  come  on  and  the  wolves  follow 
their  meat  into  the  lower  valleys,  he  may  be 
seen  running  at  the  head  of  the  pack  through 
the  pale  moonlight  or  glimmering  borealis, 


198    THE  CALL  OF  THE  WILD 

leaping  gigantic  above  his  fellows,  his  great 
throat  a-bellow  as  he  sings  a  song  of  the  younger 
world,  which  is  the  song  of  the  pack. 


FEINTED   IN   THE   UNITED    STATES   OF   AMERICA 


13    5H2 


'•^••';   ilfc  ' 

'^p 


GENERAL  LIBRARY  -  U.C.  BERKELEY 


B0007271SM 


